Category Archives: Decumulation

Decumulation, memories, miscellaneous

Photos

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It’s so nice to have photos, isn’t it? Of family. Of the house. Of that big snowstorm in winter. Of the beautiful landscape scenes you see on summer vacation. Family Christmas celebration.

Then there’s the old photo album that your grandparents had and gave to your parents. Aunt Jane, great-aunt Elizabeth, photos of croquet games, unknown children. How great it is to have all that family history.

Until, that is, 50 years or more have passed. You are the only one still alive who remembers great-aunt Elizabeth, and you aren’t quite sure the woman you remember was actually great-aunt Elizabeth or a neighbor lady. You take stock after a cousin comes by with a box of photos and says, “Keep what your want and do what you want with the rest.” And you realize the box probably has 5,000 photos in it.

And you further realize you have similar boxes of photos of your own family, you dad’s family, your mom’s family, your spouse’s dad’s family, and your spouse’s mom’s family. Is it really possible that you have 20,000 photos in the house?

That’s where we’re at. We thinned out the book collection down to a manageable number for when we downsize. The photos come next. Digitize them, you say? That removes the stacks, but doesn’t really solve the problem. Someone, sometime, will have those digital files and wonder “who the heck are these people and why do I have these files?” No, they don’t take up a lot of physical space, but they are a type of clutter, a possession passed down that is not needed and probably not wanted. Something to leave to your children to make the decision on.

This is where we are. Probably 20,000 physical photos to do something with. At some point I’ll maybe count enough to see if my estimate is close.

 

Decumulation, goals, home improvements, miscellaneous

So Busy, So Tired

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Tonight is the alignment/parade of the planets. Just after sunset, we are supposed to be able to see seven planets, a highly unusual event. Except, if you read the fine print, Saturn will be so close to the setting sun you really won’t be able to see it. The one further out from Saturn (Neptune or Uranus, I forget which), will only be visible by telescope. You need to have a cloudless sky to see it, and a rural area not beset by light pollution will help quite a bit.

I don’t know what our cloud cover will be tonight, but all the other conditions are right for viewing in my area. The light pollution is to the east of us, and the viewing will be in the western sky. But we have one pesky problem: trees. We live in a forest. Mercury and Saturn will likely be below the tree line. I’m not sure about Venus, Mercury, and Saturn.  So for us to see the planetary parade, we need to go somewhere that gives us a vista to see the four, or maybe five, planets.

But the bigger problem for me is the busyness and tiredness of the last few day, which will continue today. By the time sunset arrives, I will certainly be too tired to drive the three miles to the best venue close to me.

What’s making me so busy. In a word, decumulation. In another word, decluttering. In a third word, cleaning and organization. The last three days I’ve been working hot and heavy at these three thing, and will continue today. I’ve been purging business records, and stacking the paper for shredding. Other papers go straight into the recycling pile. I’ve also been transcribing old handwritten journal sheets into my electronic journal, and checking the odd genealogy paper against my electronic files.

I could write pages and pages about this, but I need to get to decumulation and decluttering work. I’ll let these few words speak for themselves.

Oh, by the way, yesterday I got back to writing. Editing old stuff instead of writing new stuff, but it’s part of the writing process—the first I’ve done in over a month.

Carlyle, Decumulation, home improvements, travel

Still Very Busy

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For the last week, I’ve been quite busy with small decumulation tasks. I sell a book here and there, including two on Saturday, one yesterday, and one today. Saturday I re-discovered a bunch of old computer floppy discs in The Dungeon. They are now on the way to the trash barrel, including an empty case for holding another 20 discs. I transcribed 21 old journal sheets from 2014 and 2016 from when I was working hot and heavy on Thomas Carlyle writing/research projects. I just finished that work. And today I identified two more items to list for sale.

Consequently, I don’t have a substantial blog post for today. See you all on Friday, hopefully with something a little more meaningful.

Oh, year, I also spent a couple of hours planning out a trip. It’s amazing how much time that took, and it’s not done yet.

Decumulation, Genealogy, stock market, Writing

The Word Is “Decumulation”

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Pulling writing papers out of the milk crate. I hope to be able to get rid of the crate.

This week I’ve back in the saddle, working in The Dungeon every day. Except this week I decided to do something different. I have only one chapter left to write in the Bible study I’m writing. And that’s the last of eight volumes in the Bible study series, only one volume of which I’ve so far published. I figure four more days of writing on this project.

But that is laid aside now, along with my normal stock trading activities, in favor or decumulation work. Yes, I finally figured out that’s the correct word to use for the process of getting rid of stuff. I’ve been using the word “dis-accumulation,” and all my spellcheckers have balked at its use. I don’t remember where I found the right word, but I was glad to do so.

I sold this box of books within a day of listing it. I wish all my books would sell that quickly.

We need to get out of our big house, into something smaller, hopefully closer to one of our kids. But that requires a lot of decumulation. We’ve been working on that, but perhaps somewhat half-heartedly. For the last six or so years we’ve been saying we’ll decumulate so that we can move in two years. But that two years keeps slipping.

Well, after being gone to Massachusetts last week to visit our son and his husband, I decided to make a more serious effort at decumulation. Saturday, I got another 35 books listed for sale on Facebook Marketplace. Twenty of those were in two boxes of 10 each for one price. I sold those this week, though haven’t yet got them in the customer’s hands.

A pile of papers here, a pile there. I’ll slowly whittle them down over the next few weeks.

Monday, I decided to tackle the many papers in the house. I’ve done much of this over the last few years. These papers fall in three categories: stock trading, genealogy, and writing. I’ve already discarded most of my stock trading learning courses. I scanned and digitized a lot of genealogy papers, but was holding back a few key 3-ring binders. Well, beginning on Monday I started scanning, digitizing, and discarding those papers. I figure I’m averaging close to 200 sheets of paper a day. I’m down now to about four notebooks, which I think I’ll get through two by Saturday, and the other wo next week.

Tuesday evening, I pulled from my closet the milk crate I’ve used to storing drafts of most of my early writings. This saving of drafts/edits/research papers is what an experienced writer suggested in a conference I attended many years ago. He’s a successful novelist—no telling how many boxes of papers he has in his basement. He might not be thinking about downsizing. Or if he does, he’s famous enough to donate his writing papers to his alma mater and they’d be happy to receive them. I don’t have that status.

So all his week, I’ve gone down to The Dungeon, and spent time at my scanner. Scan something. Got back to my computer, pull up the scanned file, and save it to an organized place on my computer. With my genealogy papers, I had to first create some folders and move old scans from temporary places to the new place. But that didn’t slow me down much.

I take a break at noon to do some reading and have kept evenings clear. I feel good about what I’ve done so far. Perhaps in a week I’ll be able to report significant progress at decumulation.