It’s time for a garage sale. I haven’t tackled this particular craziness in more than ten years, but it is time.

In the years since, Dear Richard and I have donated saleable goodies to a handful of local charities as well as annual fundraising sales. We’ve dragged out furniture, rugs, and I even persuaded Richard to donate many of his unused tools. We parted with three air conditioners, lamps, and more of my late mother’s earrings than a jewelry store could stock at one time. Even my handblown wedding Austrian crystal now graces someone else’s dining table. But it was okay – all those pass-it-on cleanouts felt good. The right thing to do. And each one involved a crammed SUV or a neighbor’s truck. Goodbye. No tears.

Now the walls are closing in. We need more room and more sanity going forward into these later years. I tell myself I don’t miss most of the items we donated. We weren’t using them. But lots of nostalgia went out the door. I said a long goodbye to the rug Tom and I had made in China. All those decades ago, we selected the pattern, the colors, and the weight. We designed a whole room around it – five times in four states. It didn’t work in this house, but it was chock-a-block with memories when it went out the door. As with most of what we gave away, if it is out-of-sight, it is out-of-mind. I hope.

When will I be able to let go of the little orange glass bird – the first gift my grandson picked out for me? It just fits in my hand. Out of sight and mind? I dunno. It sits where I can see it, and a little blond boy’s face pops into my mind with each glance. At age four he was anxiously anticipating my reaction when I opened it. Will she like it? He was so happy when I smiled, declaring I loved it – thirteen years ago. Not handing it over. Yet.

The end of the month is the deadline for our major purge. It is a work in progress, and we are culling items for sale every day. A drawer in the morning. A closet on a Sunday. A cabinet on a Thursday night.

Today I tackled the kitchen. I didn’t realize how many duplicate items I had stashed in my utility drawers. I hung onto them, kidding myself, that when I need a specific tool, I often can’t find it. If there are two, I have a better chance of putting my hand on one quickly or not opening the dishwasher in mid-cycle. Six quality knives that I apparently never use are leaving.

The first drawer is semi-organized – basic tools for everyday use plus the can opener. I’m now wondering when I last used the oyster knife, the grapefruit knife, the pasta cutter. The rule is the same as with ditching older clothes: If you haven’t used it in five years, out it goes. Goodbye, oyster knife.

Then there’s the overflow drawer – the DFH – the Drawer from Hell. Any other tool you’d expect to find in a serious cook’s drawer is in the overflow DFH – four ice cream scoops, the avocado scoop, and a meatball scoop; two divided trays of screwdrivers, pliers, small wrenches, hammer, etc. And anything else you might need to survive the kitchen wars. Plus, four jar openers, three melon ballers, two cheese slicers … and a partridge in a pear tree.

The lobster crackers and picks reside in a Ziploc bag in the very back of the DFH. I kept them not knowing when there might be a steaming hot pound and a half crustacean for crackin’ and pickin’. Be still my heart.

I also tackled the deep bottom utility drawer and removed five of the eight pie plates and one of the three bundt pans. Sets of molds, a handful of graters, and an extra eggbeater filled out that box destined for the sale.

So far, just three linear feet of cookbooks are getting the heave-ho. I realize that I now hunt for recipes on the computer as much as in my cookbook shelves. But how did I go from the Joy of Cooking and Julia Child to this enormous collection? It took about fifty years, and it just sort of … happened.

In the remaining two weeks before the sale, we’re tackling the storage eaves, the big linen closet upstairs, and the pantry shelves. Then, PLEASE PRAY FOR US, the garage. I’m counting on Tylenol Extra Strength and the heating pad to get me to those sale tables in the driveway.

Now if I could just remember where I stowed the cash box.

Mary O’Brien writes from Warren.