I Got Zippo

I've been here in Minneapolis since Sunday, coming to help my precious daughter with her knee surgery. I packed my orange Zippo bag with everything I'd need for 4 days - two cardigans, one scarf, one skirt, my jeggings, my tights, some shirts and socks and other 'stuff'. I packed an extra pair of earrings, my two other favorite rings, and that was it.

As I sit here typing I had this fantasy thought (I do that a lot) of what it would be like to ONLY own these things that fit in my orange bag. That's it. No paintings, no books, no crap, no dishes no CDs no nothing. Just this. Just me. I felt lighter. Happier. I remembered when I was going through my divorce and I moved the kids into a small two bedroom apartment overlooking Island Park. I'd left with nearly just the clothes off my back, so there wasn't much in the apartment, anyway. What do I remember about those 6 months? It only took 1/2 hour to clean the WHOLE apartment. I estimate that to thoroughly clean our whole house would take at least 9 hours. Does that mean we own 18 times as much stuff as before, in a house 18 times bigger? Most likely, and add the huge backyard and garage and we're on our way to overload in a hurry.

No wonder I'm thinking about stuff lately; about too much stuff lately. And I DO think too much, too, so I'm sure it's all related. Am I still off cows and pigs? Heck yeah. I'm hardly eating any animal protein these days and I feel great. Clean, open, lighter. I'm not even craving sugar these days. What will happen when I get home and plop my little Zippo bag on the floor, surrounded by the rest of my larger-than-life life? I don't know, but something is shifting underneath me, and I dearly hope it's the bottom dropping out of my preconceived thought patterns. I can almost hear all my excess baggage whistling through the cracks in my consciousness. I'm excited to see what will happen next. Who will get eliminated in the next round? Stay tuned to find out...