I’ll be doing more packing today, and I’ve already done a ton of packing – and it has all involved going through forgotten or mostly forgotten possessions and throwing things away.  Getting rid of stuff seems to help with discarding psychological baggage, as well.  Some things are easy to toss, but others make you hesitate, and then you have to figure out what made you keep them in the first place.  Does it remind you of a happy time with the person who gave it to you?  Does it remind you of someone you’d rather forget?  Are you keeping it because the giver would make you feel guilty if you didn’t?  If you got it for yourself, do you use it?  Do you love it?  Are you keeping it only because, dammit, you paid good money for it?  (We seem to have a lot of that last kind.)  We’re still going to be moving a huge amount of stuff to the new place, and we’ll need to cut back even more as we unpack, because the new house is smaller – but I’m looking forward to it, actually.

I had forgotten what it was like to sell an old home to a first-time home buyer.  *sigh*  Yes, there’s lead paint.  The house was built in 1870.  Yes, there’s asbestos (although most of it has been taken out) because that’s what they used to use for insulation.  All the time.  Everywhere.  Yes, storm windows for windows this size are expensive, and yes, things settle and don’t look perfectly straight.  I’m actually glad that we filled out a disclosure statement and were absolutely honest about the house, because nobody can claim that we hid anything.  I’m also glad that we had multiple offers on the house in case these buyers pull out, but what a pain that will be.  I liked them when I met them, and I think they’d do nice things to the house.  I also don’t want to have to make huge changes in the contract we have for the new house, because those sellers really want to get moving, too.  We shall see.