Advent Journal: The Purge

(The winter wheat survived its first winter storm.
Photo credit: The Man.)

I've done it. I've gone through the cupboard with all the orphaned tupperware lids and, yea, I have taken out the lids and verily I have put them in the recycling.

I have accepted that the mates to these lids are gone. They have run off to the wild rumpus, which is where wayward, wanton lids go.

I have kept the three or four containers that have lost their lids. They have some potential to be useful, and besides, there is something about a lidless container that makes you feel sorry for it. They're like men whose wives have left them for the milkmen. They've been duped, dumped, taken for granted. I am willing to give them a home until they decide to take a swim in the dishwasher and get melted into weird, unhelpful-for-food-storage shapes.

I have gone through the cabinet with the bowls and the 47 candlesticks we got for wedding gifts and the collection of candle stubs that I'm holding onto because ... because ... well, why am I holding onto those candle stubs? I finally forced myself to throw away the chipped cereal bowl that I've kept for years because one day I might make a mosaic table top. Really, I might.

I have been hating the clutter of these cabinets for well over a year, probably closer to two. Guess how long it took me to straighten them out? Fifteen minutes, tops.

(I believe the marigolds, a few days ago simply past their prime,
are now very much over. But didn't they go out pretty? Photo credit: The Man)

So, anyway, yes, I'm doing an Advent purge. We have too much stuff, and I'm tired of it. How can I prepare a straight path, as wildman John the B would have me do, if my pathways are stewn with candle stubs and chipped cereal bowls?

I spend most of my purge time today in Jack's room, going through his closets and taking out stuff he no longer plays with (or, in some cases, never played with--my kids have too much stuff!). Why, I ask you, why did he have one entire closet shelf piled with EMPTY Lego Starwars boxes? All the models have been built (and probably destroyed, their pieces dumped into the massive ocean of Lego flowing through our house), and yet, the boxes remain, gathering dust in some prime storage real estate.

Sometimes I do not understand my own life. Time to purge! Make straight the paths!

***

Jody asked what Advent book I was reading. It's a quite wonderful collection called God With Us: Rediscovering the Meaning of Christmas. It has readings for every day of Advent. Last week all entries were by Richard John Neuhaus; this week we hear from Scott Cairns. Other writers include Kathleen Norris and the poet Luci Shaw. There's a marvelous introduction by Eugene Peterson. It's a book I've thought about buying for years and am so glad I finally did.