Heartbreak. My siblings and I recently put our parents’ estate up for sale. My heart broke again. The grief came in waves just as it did when they each passed away. Most of us will have to walk this path one day. Cleaning out and selling your parents’ estate is a painful process. It is hard on sibling relationships but equally hard on an only child. It’s hard anyway you experience it. I have no advice.
Well, that’s not true. If I could go back, I would forget to try to make my mom clean up her house, go through boxes, cupboards, and get rid of things. I was envisioning helping my mother go through “dӧstӓdning” the Swedish death cleaning, a practice of decluttering one’s house so that loved ones do not have to sort it out when you are gone. It sounded practical and pragmatic. I went into the visit with guns blazing; determined to help my mother clean out each drawer and closet.
What my mother really wanted to do was take old photographs and newspaper articles out of boxes and spread them out on the kitchen table. She wanted to talk about the newspaper clippings that she had saved when one of us won some award or was in some performance. She wanted to tell us about her grandmother Jennie Campbell who played the piano for her boarders every Sunday at the Old Alpha or about Thora Lund, her grandmother who lived in the Lofoten Islands in Norway way up in the Arctic Circle. I thought I had heard enough of those stories, so I did not think to delve deeper or say, “Yes, I remember, Mom. Tell me more.” Instead, I huffed and puffed, and rolled my eyes like a teenager and said, “Mom, we are trying to clean up, don’t take more stuff out!” Little did I know that would be the last time I saw my mother, conscious.
I wish I had probed my father for his family stories. He was not one to overshare. He let mom do that, but I know he must have had wonderful stories to tell about his family in Gig Harbor and Tacoma in the early days, camping, digging for geoducks and clams, taking his uncle’s ferry boat across the Narrows in the Puget Sound or driving his grandfather’s Model T across the “Galloping Gertie” Narrow’s bridge on a windy day.
When we finally decided to sell the family estate, I flew back when I could. I touched the wooden beams, cabinets, bricks, door handles, everything that reminded me of my father. He was the kind of man who would go to a friend’s house and check their door handles to make sure they were not rattling. He would come back later with a screwdriver or just the right tool and fix them. He never expected a thank you, his thoughtfulness was the outflow of his big heart.
How do you get over heartbreak and loss, the loss of a loved one or the loss of a home? I don’t know, but as I went through the many items in the house, I made a point to honor the person in my spirit. I thanked God for their life. Sometimes I said, “I see you. You are remembered and honored. I will keep your memory alive.” Don’t be too hasty to throw things away. Keep something of each person who journeyed through your life and left footprints through your history. Find a way to honor them or write their story so it will not be forgotten. This heals our heart.
When I am overwhelmed with sadness or hopelessness in this often-difficult world, I remind myself to practice gratitude. I try to think of something, anything to thank God for. So, I thank God for the home on the beach, my loving parents, the beach creatures that graced my childhood, the sunsets, sunrises, and the gentle waves on the shore. There is no easy way to get through grief, but to heal through whispers of gratitude.
