Yesterday, I got my relatively small pile of boxes and tote bags into a small storage unit. (I paid to have them picked up and moved...from this moment forward, never again will that be the job of me or my 70-something friends!) That I was able to arrange and coordinate it all in about four days is a minor miracle, and I am immensely grateful. They are safe for now.
But this morning, I am thinking about storage, because looking back, since 1990 and my move away from New York City, I have had belongings in storage an inordinate amount of time. I have stored things with friends, in their basements or garages or barns. I swoon at the thought of what would have been the monetary value of these stretches of time, and realize that in each case it was nothing short of an act of incredible love. Somehow that is hitting me now in a way it never did before. I feel so thankful but know that may be completely inadequate.
There have been several other stretches of time when I have used commercial storage units, the pivot points to other big changes of direction. In the end, my life has been "in storage" (real or metaphorical) constantly, and if I had completely understood many decades ago that -- as my kind of mystic -- I was unlikely to ever function in a "normal" American way, I might never have allowed myself to accumulate anything.
Yet I am a creative being, one who derives comfort and a sense of beauty and warmth from some longstanding treasures, art objects and books. Because of having moved so often, I've needed to look on a new dresser top at familiar pictures or little mementos. Yes, I've weeded out once again, but I have kept the books I will need on hand when I speak for the Goddess, and some of the memorabilia of my unconventional journey. Over this coming month or so, I pray that I find a longer term home for these items and for me. Funny (?) how it's actually easier and cheaper to "place" boxes than it is to "place" a person!
Another aspect of a life like mine is having had to both gain and lose so many precious belongings. I accumulated the most after my mom died and my dad headed across country. I suddenly owned a wonderful old dresser, one of my grandmother's lamps, the other grandmother's desk, and my childhood dollhouse (actually, my mother's, dating from the 1930's). For a year or two, I had a wonderful tiny rental apartment with everything out on full display, and I felt complete, wanted, and part of the small community in which I lived. But suddenly that situation evaporated from without, the dresser went to another family member, and I sold the lamp and desk in a sidewalk sale. It took another year to finally sell the bulky wooden dollhouse and its amazing historical contents (old fashioned kitchen appliances, lamps, beds, and very lifelike dolls). The latter still haunts me. It's almost like a limb that was cut off and I still feel it. But it was absolutely too heavy to carry.
I guess I'm one of those people who would be a millionaire if our economy gifted experience, wisdom, creativity, and the other factors in my kind of unconventional life. I hold onto that, not out of bitterness, but just knowing deeply (most days, recently!) that it has all been of value. And I am learning that when I can get my belongings -- and my deepest self -- out of storage and into the light, that is when I am most who I was meant to be.
