What do you do when it's time to pack up your childhood home? It's not what I did, it's what I felt. Confused, sad, ready, overwhelmed. Did I mention sad? My father would have loved to be a part of the garage clean-up. He always meant to "tackle it" and loved when we would come over for spring cleaning in the summer, fall and winter months. That's the thing about time, you always think you have more than you really do. Tomorrow becomes a week, which turns into a month, which transitions into Happy New Year, etc. The garage was the only place my father could call his own. When you have 4 daughters and a wife, a garage is sacred, a kingdom where only he reigned! He would go out in the garage and say a few "choice words", tinker, think, stumble upon a project and do his thing. Yes, there was something very special about our garage and I would find out the stories that were in there years after my father's passing.

My great aunt (my father's aunt) was a school teacher. When she retired she became a genealogist. She spend years putting together a very extensive history of my father's ancestry. She would write letters, scour through hours and hours of microfiche at local libraries and ask questions to anyone that she thought might be know something about a family member. I came across a stack of typewritten pages (on onionskin paper!) that gave me insight into our lineage. It seems that the first Schmaus (later named Smouse) came from Germany to America in 1721. I read the first paragraph and honestly couldn't really comprehend the magnitude of what I was reading and had to put it aside. This would have to wait until I could lay it all out on my own dining room table and go from page-to-page sipping some sort of hot beverage while America the Beautiful played in the background. Plus, I had just arrived at the house and there were lots of hours, boxes, paperwork and pictures ahead of me.

The next letter I came across was from my eldest sister to my parents. The letter was written when she was in college at FSU in 1978. The letter was describing what happened at the Chi Omega House sorority house and a killer named Ted Bundy. My sister resided in dorm that was minutes from Chi Omega. Her boyfriend (my future brother-in-law) rented an apartment that was a block away from the shack Bundy was living in. You can here her fear in the letter. I'm not sure why I took this letter home with me. I talked to her about it. She doesn't want it back. I tore the letter into a thousand little pieces and threw it away.

There were so many pictures of my parents, their parents, my sisters, my children, my nieces and nephews. Diplomas, love letters, report cards, baby books, tools and an overwhelming sense of a life well lived. Our garage was the keeper of all things good and perhaps, the not-so-good. I don't know about the not-so-good since we are a family that focuses on the good. My mother and father's humble beginnings was a theme that ran throughout my childhood and has spilled over into my adult life. It took us 8 hours to remove everything from the garage - toss what was not salvageable, keep what we wanted to reflect on and put back what we wanted to donate. We began packing our past a couple of weeks ago and are giving ourselves at least another several weeks to complete this daunting task. We could take forever do this, but that not the timetable that we have. However, the time that we do have has been spent laughing, crying, singing, dancing, eating, and thanking God for the memories that will always been ours to enjoy and pass on. Sisters always. Family forever!

This writing is dedicated to any and all who show up - no matter what.

XO

Kim

#goodbye #heal #past #future #letgo #moveforward