the elephant in the room

Ok, first this: For the love of Pete! After drinking more water, recording food intake, cutting out the processed snacks, and increasing fruit and veggie intake; not to mention swimming a mile, biking 24 miles, and running 6 miles back to back, you would think I'd drop more than ONE STINKING POUND in a week! I mean, yes, it's in the right direction, and no, I don't expect those ridiculous "Biggest Loser" losses in a week, but is TWO too much to ask?????

Just had to get that out of my system. I guess I'll take the one pound. (That plus last week is the two pounds I put on last month.) It was just so much easier to put them on than to take them off! This week, since I seem to get the night time munchies, I am instituting the "cup of herbal tea after dinner" rule. Maybe that'll get me another 2 ounces. Or something.

And now this:

Now that it's July, I'm more than half way into the "one thing a day for a year" plan for decluttering. And I found myself back in the bedroom. And while last week I successfully dodged the one area I really needed to be focusing on, this week, I took the opposite approach.

Of course, some things were easy, no-brainers. Like going through the pile of socks without matches and throwing out the socks that have been there for a long enough period (July 6). Some things took a little bit of thought and effort, like going through some binders from courses I took and weeding out papers that I don't need. (Recycling bin. July 7) Or taking some paints out of a box with craft supplies and putting them aside to give to my nieces. (July 8) Some things are part a bigger project, like finishing a book and putting it in a donation bag (July 9) or finishing the video course and putting the videos in the donation bag, as well (July 10), or putting a pair of socks in the other donation bag on laundry day (July 11).

Then there's the big elephant in the corner. Or, in my case, the wooden flute in the corner. M gave me that flute when we were still together. He was a pretty good musician. He was the reason I started playing guitar. He also had a thing for Native American music and handmade flutes. He had 3 or 4 of them; he got me one at a festival along with an instruction pamphlet. The flute was a bit harder for me to pick up than the guitar, but I still practiced it, imagining of the two of us playing together.

After we broke up, I never had the desire to play the flute again.

For a while, I agonized over what I was going to do with it. I asked every musician-type person I knew. Nobody was interested in it. My friends had other ideas: "Let's burn it!", "Let's smash it", "Let's bury it in a pile of manure!" While I could see where the emotions behind those suggestions came from, I couldn't bring myself to destroy a musical instrument, and a handmade one, at that. (I inwardly cringe when I see old footage of The Who smashing their guitars onstage) In the end, the flute became a non-object. Though it was in the bedroom, my eyes passed right over it and I ceased to see it. It simply sat in the corner and gathered dust.

That's the thing about this decluttering goal: I'm forced to look at those non-objects and see them as objects. Objects I need to make a decision about.

And last week, I decided to send the flute back to M.

Even though that decision may re-open wounds that have healed or open up a whole other can of worms that I haven't even anticipated.

The bottom line is, when I really had to decide what I wanted to do with this one object I had been avoiding, I decided I wanted to send it where it would be used and appreciated. And he is the only person I know who would use and appreciate it.

Strange...I haven't even SEEN the flute for months. But now that it's gone, I look into the corner and miss it.