It’s no secret that I’m “going tiny”.  I have not yet decided where I’ll park my tiny house.   I’m still weighing my options.  Expect me to occupy a dainty lot somewhere between the Beltway and the Northern Lights.  When I make my final decision, you’ll be the first to know — right after my son, my siblings, and the lessor of the plot where I finally choose to land.

I’ve downsized before now but not on such a noble scale.  I’ve moved and married enough times in sixty-one (and three-quarters) years to understand the process.  But I still cringe when I survey the boxes on the wide shelves in the basement.  In these dusty tubs, a child’s life unfolds on shiny squares shoved in loose-flapped envelopes with ads for obsolete film services.  Stacks of yellowed artwork and book reports nestle amid the T-ball group photos and three weddings’ worth of memorabilia.  Spiral notebooks fall open on dog-eared notes to and from a friend who worked off her legal fees cleaning my cluttered, neglected home.

I’m not complaining about the memories, nor about the hours which I will spend sorting through them.  I’ve promised myself to take it slow.  I have two months to get this done.  Near Kidder, Missouri, the tiny house takes shape under the capable hands of my builder.   Here in Brookside, my head slowly begins to lift itself as I hack away at the heavy veil in which I’ve long been shrouded.  Lightness of being beckons.

 I hold the memories in my wildly-beating heart.  I will keep two small containers of mementos. Anything more would weigh too much to carry.

It’s the ninth day of the forty-third month of My Year Without Complaining.  Life continues.