One of the actions I undertook to assuage my overwhelm this holiday season was some bold decluttering. While I know decluttering is such a catch-phrase…such a mainstay-to-the-point-of-enough-already of this modern age…it really does help me. Especially when I do it alone, without the rest of the family around to comment. Nora is the best at decluttering in our family. She will pick up, like, a textbook she is currently using, and be like, “I don’t think I need this anymore.” Aidy and J (sorry, J) are the worst. The other day as I was getting very down to business, tearing my way through bins of toys in the basement and clothes drawers, I discovered a random plastic container of about 15 CDs (no cases) under our bed. Scratched and of unknown origin. I should have dumped them in the garbage but instead I sighed and showed them to J, for fear if he found them there - in the garbage - we would have to have AN INTENSE DISCUSSION. “CDs!” he said. He proceeded to wipe them down with a microfiber cloth. I watched him do this while I continued my frenzied bout of purging and decided that I would not make any commentary on the irony.

The fact is that our house is fairly decluttered at this point, thanks to my practicing the skill over the years. But our attic, which includes both a finished and unfinished part becomes, of course, a hotbed of many undesired - but not enough that we are ready to get rid of them - things. So this morning I took a 15 minute break from work to start going through some of the problem areas. Sort of a paradise of organizing up there, really, if you like that sort of thing.

One of the first piles I came across were some loose drawings and notebooks of Aidy’s. I long ago swore off keeping every piece of kids’ artwork; every carefully penned note. But Aidy’s…hers are so good. It’s not just because she’s my youngest, although I think that’s part of it, as I cling to her childhood as long as possible. It’s also because she’s so incredibly passionate, both in the written and verbal forms of language. It’s like we had two rather Irish, self-contained children, and one final very Italian one. She has been trying to swear since she was a baby, devoid of the real words, so finding her own means of inflicting pain through poetry (two of my favorites: when she told Nora, who was carefully brushing her hair and must have caught a tangle, that, she “wished she had a real sister,” and the time when she informed Gabe that she was going to “turn him into a diaper and wear him.”)

On the flip side, her passion comes through as love, too, and it wraps me up and keeps me warm. Every night I tell the kids goodnight, and that I love them. And I know that Gabe and Nora love me, I do, so it doesn’t bother me in the slightest that their response is nearly always, “ok.” I get the impossibility of expressing oneself as a kid, as a teen. But Aidy’s! Aidy’s response is a torrent. “I love you SO MUCH that it’s as big as the WORLD you are the BEST MOM that ever lived, and I can’t believe YOU ARE MY MOM I hope you have the most amazing night of sleep, sweet dreams and everything you have ever wanted, I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU MOMMY, goodnight.”

Her notes are similarly ardent, full of absolute joy and also bordering on melodrama, and she provides them regularly, often giving J and I a note at bedtime to inform us that we are the most wonderful parents and she loves “each and every day with us.” (Please note that she may or may not have also informed us on the very same day that she lives in the most boring house, so boring she might have to go to the hospital).

Today, while decluttering in the attic, trying to beat the clock and donate all the old things before new ones arrive, I stumbled upon some of her notes and stopped right there, reveling in their hilarity and heart. There are lots of things to get rid of, yes, and there are so very many I want to keep.