A few months ago I had occaision to have a little visit with my sister at her office- she runs the local homeless shelter - its really much more than that - its a training center, a gatering place and they have a daily supper that everyone is welcome to and the staff and the youth sit down and have dinner conversations "family style"! Its really amazing and they do so much more than I can include here without loosing sight of the jist of this post. Check out the program HERE AT MYHOUSE
Anyhoo.... I digress, and she rarely gets to have a spare minute so when I get to say hi to here there its a treat! We started talking about purses and how I have a giant purse - Chelle only carries a wallet. The roles used to be reversed and I only carried a wallet and she had a giant bag. High school times.
This is my bag. It is about 40 pounds worth and has everything from chargers and cough drops to water bottle, first aid kit and also a sewing kit, Narcan and some quarters for a load of laundry or a newspaper! We laughed about it for a minute and she said - "I dont need a giant bag - I can get anything I need in about 5 minutes at a store or borrow from a neighbor!" I said "Everything I need to save your life is in that bag!"
She paused for just a second and then asked "Why would you need to carry all that with you? Whose life is in danger?" I had not thought about it for a while but the life I want to save is the life I missed saving almost 8 years ago. This giant bag of crap is a trauma response to the death of my son, Rye. If I have everything I need to save a life, I wont miss it the next time around - no matter who it is! There is a comfort in knowing that. There is little comfort in carrying that much crap around though. It can be painful! It also has to have "enough" pens and paper! I have no idea how much exactly "enough" is though!
I also have some household hoarding that I am dealing with too (see above grocery bag that is half full of filled water bottles). Books too - lots and lots of books!
I am working through it and have abandoned the giant bag for now in favor of a wallet that holds a lot of stuff but weighs only about 2 pounds! It has been freeing and epiphanous all at the same time. I am looking around at all the piles and begining to go through some of them - downsizing a lot of them and creating more manageable space. Its a good thing and it might save a life anyway!
I hope that you have all that you need to save a life and that you can carry it all in a big heart and a small sack!
Blessed Be!
