Yard 'sales' help weed out clutter

In a previous column, I said I was though with clutter ...

That was last year! More recently, I resolved to fix the problem by holding a yard sale that weeded three sheds, two closets and a horse tack room. I also thinned down a closet and a few shelves and drawers inside the house.

I took my entire week's vacation setting up, running the sale and tearing it down.

Today I looked in my large barn-shaped shed and it was pretty skimpy, not much stuff bulging at the seams.

The stuff was an accumulation of at least four decades - shopping trips from long ago and lots from recent years.

It all stacks up faster than we can imagine. Men must find the things we women buy on impulse hard to digest. But, wait, now, I do know some impulsive men who can give us a run for their money. I know quite a few male packrats.

Anyway, my sale catered to everyone. Watching it all go to dozens of families did my heart good. It seemed that everything went to appropriate homes and away from mine.

When I have a sale, which isn't often, I sometimes find it difficult to part with the stuff I've packed around so long. That's just it. I've packed it around - packed and stored - packed and stored for years.

I bit my lip when I let my Dad's old power keyhole saw go. But the elderly gentleman who got the bargain would truly appreciate it. Several younger men took home some other tools that I will no longer need. I am a person who, unfortunately, ends up with duplicates. Don't ask me why, but I seemed to have collected two or three of many things. The problem is, when you pack things away, you forget you have them. So when you need the item sometime down the road, if you are like me, you end up buying another one even though borrowing truly makes more sense.

Idle items, anything that isn't put to good use, just take up space. Thank goodness we are still allowed to have a couple of yard sales a year without being penalized. I'm just holding my breath that the government won't decide to capitalize on this American tradition.

The fun part of yard sales is the small talk with folks who stop to shop. Sometimes, I find they don't live that far away and I didn't know they existed.

Some of my shoppers told me they watched my house go up and said what a great plan I had, living in an RV for several months while building the house.

Of course living on a beaten path, more people know me than vice-a-versa.

If you plan a yard sale you really need to have something for everyone. This last sale I had included tools, camp gear and sporting goods for guys, household, novelty stuff for the gals and toys for kids.

An antique appraiser told me recently that with this economic decline situation, people aren't buying non-functional items - antiques or not.

According to him, collectibles aren't a big draw these days unless they serve a functional purpose of some sort.

Antiques and collectibles seem to run in cycles as far as popularity, he told me. Fortunately for me I sold a lot of functional items. In fact, most of my stuff served a purpose that made sense.

The magic of getting rid of the unwanted and unused is the emptiness left behind.

During the days I was setting up for the sale, I stared at one shed, debating with myself as what to get rid of. I've done this numerous times before when I had yard sales. This time, it was going to be different, I promised myself.

"Don't let your emotions rule," I insisted. "Bite the bullet and let it go."

Actually, I feel better about myself for just making that decision. After all, it's just stuff and you can't take it with you.

"Simplify your life," I kept repeating each time I encountered an item I'd hung onto for more than a decade.

Life can be simple and the fact that we complicate it is beyond me.

Gadgets are the biggest problem in occupying drawers and shelves. There are gadgets for every application these days and half of them are pure junk.

I vow to be more selective in the future.

Do I really need this? Not.