I learned a valuable lesson today.
For the last two months, the ladies at church have been asking us to volunteer to help one of the older ladies in our ward unpack her new house. Considering they have been asking for two months, I was surprised that there was still work that needed to be done. Still, sensing some availability in my schedule, I decided two months later that I should probably do my part and lend a helping hand.
This morning, I came in with an attitude ready to work.
“Alright Sister, where can we start?” Me and another girl worked like lemmings, moving boxes and attempting to unpack as much as possible. I didn’t feel the need to get out of there, exactly… I just wanted the time I spent there to be as efficient as possible. There was so much work to be done, I was a little surprised that so little had been accomplished in the last two months. We moved boxes of beautiful possessions, lovely antiques, genuinely vintage stationary, delicate china. It was such a privilege to peak into the boxes.
“Ok,” I asked, not impatiently, just in the attitude of doing, “Should I wash this china and put them in your cabinets?”
“Oh… I dunno,” the old lady said slowly. “Maybe you can move this box into the living room and go through it with me. There’s so many things I need to sort through, throw away.”
I tracked down some garbage bags and got ready to toss. The first thing on the top of the box was a beautiful, old Bible. She picked it up tenderly, and held it for a moment before telling me all about her Daddy reading this Bible to her when she was a little girl, how she’d jump up on his knee whenever he pulled it out. Then she gingerly held up her late husband’s set of scriptures. She told us what a wonderful man was, how he had helped her pack up all these things right before she moved, when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer and three months left to live.
“He never even felt sick,” she remembered to herself.
Each item in the box had a memory, even little newspaper clippings and old greeting cards from friends and neighbors from 1973, an exercise book by Richard Simmons back in his glory days. She had little photos that gave us little clues to this woman’s rich life. It took a long time to sift through just the one box.
We threw away very little.
As we were sorting through anecdotes and objects, I realized why so little progress was being made in the house: This women didn’t need someone to speed her life up. She needed someone to slow down with her.
Slow down, my friends. Slow down.
Dang girl! Make me cry! Beautiful…..as one who LOVES personal stories,I REALLY appreciated this. What a great lesson for a sweet young newlywed to learn now rather than later.
I have chills. You're right. We do need to all slow down and enjoy every little insignificant moment… because really, every moment is significant. I've had experiences similar to yours, over and over in my clinical rotations in the hospitals. I've had many patients who are old and move in slow motion, and can't hear…. and I get so frustrated. But when I take the time to sit down on their bed and listen to them, I never fail to fall in love with them, and their amazing life stories.
I love this. A sympathetic view of people who collect things. Sentimentality is so meaningful, but it takes up so much space! In the end, though, I think I can even part with mementos from the past because what makes them truly meaningful is how they represent human relationships. We don't need to hang on to all of our tangibles to try and recapture intangibles, although a few are nice.