Tuesday Ten: Junk

Ten Things I'd Like to be Rid of Forever

1. Stretch marks.
My first pregnancy, I was so excited that I had no stretch marks. Three weeks before she was born, my lovely lady dropped from high to low within what seemed like hours. I felt like I was walking with a bowling ball in my pelvis, and my belly was striped purple. They got longer and wider with each pregnancy. Of course, if I had the money for cosmetic surgery to erase them, I'd spend it on something else, so I'm stuck with them.

2. The dresser in the basement.
I've been cleaning the basement. You know how doing a deep clean has that stage where it looks worse before it gets better because you've dragged everything out in the open for sorting? Well, that's where I was when I got sick. I managed to haul off bags of trash, recycling, Goodwill items. But the old dresser is still sitting there, right in the way. Every time I want to get a jar of jam out of the storage cupboard I have to move the dresser. I'm leaving it there, though, because the more irritating the darn thing becomes, the more likely it is I'll actually get rid of it.

3. Doll parts.
The younger of the lovely ladies was a doll-lover. I bought her first porcelain doll on Ebay, thinking she'd put the lovely doll on a shelf and look at it adoringly. Oh no. She wanted to play with the doll, which she named Julie. I got over my ideas of what one does with lovely porcelain dolls and glued Julie's leg many times, along with Isabelle's arm and Amy's hair. Lovely lady has given up all but one special porcelain doll, which sits neatly on her shelf. Poor thing. Who knew I'd feel sorry for a lovely doll who has no adventures and doesn't get to sleep with her girl at night? Anyway. Those poor no-longer-beloved, cracked, hairless creatures still have salvageable parts. One has a lovely set of arms, another a beautiful face, a third a pretty dress and fine legs, and there's a pretty good head of hair floating around the bottom of the box. I keep meaning to post the doll parts on Freecycle, but I just haven't gotten around to it.

4. Psst! Can I get rid of other people's stuff?
That noisy merry-go-round toy with the annoying repetitive music, the horse clock of loving husband's that he won at the fair when he was 12, a few clothing items belonging to the lovely ladies? I'll bet loving husband would never miss that awful clock. He wouldn't even know it had disappeared. If he asked I could always say, "Oh, I'm sure it's in a box around here somewhere." Which also gives me an incentive not to finish cleaning the basement: No boxes=no excuse for the missing clock.

5. The couch.
I'll admit, I'm a little sentimental about the couch. The very first time I went to loving husband's house, before he was loving husband, we sat on his couch and talked. He was so completely embarrassed by his awful old couch (which I didn't notice, by the way, since I wasn't interested in dating the sofa) that he went and bought new living room furniture the next day, which is very sweet. It was a fine couch in its day. I'd feel even more sentimental about the couch, though, if it weren't broken down, uncomfortable, and impossible to get out of. I'm ready for a new couch.

6. Memories of an old boyfriend. The "what was I thinking?" kind of guy. Don't you wish there were some kind of memory eraser that you could use to scrub out memories like that? Then when I walked by him yesterday at the store, I wouldn't have shuddered and asked myself all over again, Honestly, what was I thinking? At least yesterday I wasn't wearing my baggiest sweats, and my hair looked good. I wonder if he thought, Honestly, what was I thinking? Naaaah, I'm pretty sure he's still pining away for me. (With a ha ha added for those of you who are sitting there thinking, "Geesh, she's really full of herself!" That was tongue-in-cheek, folks.)

7. That stain in the carpet. Even the carpet cleaner guy can't get it out. I have no idea what it is or how it got there. I just want it to go away.

8. Any business name using the letter "K" in place of "C."
Like "Karly's Kut-n-Kurl" or "Kozee Kottages." Barf. I know they're not mine to get rid of, but wouldn't I be doing the world a service? Anyone up for a huge sign burning in the back yard?

9. Bad attitudes.
Whining, moaning, sulking, griping, complaining, moping, and just general pain-in-the-assedness.

Mine, that is.

Oh, and I'd like to lose the kids' bad attitudes too. Then we'd all be happy and so dang cheery you'd want to slap us all silly.

10. My used curricula.
Well, not mine. More accurately, lovely lady's eighth grade books and such from last year. It's all been sorted into keep, sell, give away. "Keep" has been shelved. "Give away" has been given. "Sell," well, I just haven't gotten up the gumption to do it, so there's a huge pile of books on my sewing table. I'm afraid that by the time I get around to it, I might as well just keep it for the fine young gents.