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 There have been many places I’ve lived and loved, wanting to bring home a piece of the regions essence and beauty with me. Oh how I remember the days before digital cameras, ebook readers, mp3 players and email. Nowadays, travel is so much more compact, friendly and sharable! In my fledgling days of world travel, I resorted to writing long letters and sending a ton of post cards to my friends and family. I still think that such an art is appreciated by many, although today’s method of armchair travel is far less expensive, instantaneous and easily-shared via the web. And over the past few years of rekindled travelling, I’ve made a conscious and notable effort to write letters or postcards, letting those whom I appreciate and love in life know that I think of them often.
During my 20 years abroad, being the packrat that I am, I would carry home souvenirs of the countries I visited and remnants of the events that had an impact. Right now, I find myself in an emotional quandary about donating some incredibly beautiful and useful travel photo books and guides from the places where my heart-strings were plucked like a wailing banjo. Moreover, destroying paper and photos that hold remarkable memories of an amazing and love-filled past (including home-made cards from my childhood days) is extremely difficult to do! Some of the examples of things which hold sentimental value:
- a program from the 300 way record at Skydive Chicago in which 3 of the lead organizers are no longer with us (yet these friends still remain fondly in my heart and memories)
- a program from the Alice Spring Camel Cup races in 1990 (Australia)
- ‘A Photographic Essay of the Huon Valley’, signed by the author (Tasmania, Australia)
- ‘Explore Australia: The Complete Touring Companion’
- a beautiful map of Tenerife from the 6 weeks I lived there (Spain)
- ‘Traveller’s Guide to South Africa’
- Reader’s Digest: ‘Wild New Zealand’
- Discovery Channel: ‘Insight Guide, Iceland’
- ‘The Red Devils: Red on, Green on, Go!’, signed by Eddie Carrol, Airborne D4840
- ‘Changing the Guard – Official Programme’ (I was a Guardsman on Parliament Hill, Ottawa Canada in my last year of Uni — yes, I wore a scarlet wool tunic, drill boots with cleats, a hot and sweaty bearskin hat plus I carried a FNC1 rifle, just like at Buckingham Palace)
Update: My sister took the beautiful table photography books for her bed and breakfast guests to enjoy. It’s much easier for me to purge when I know that it’s going to a home where the item(s) are actually used and enjoyed!
 
  A funny thing seems to be happening with the fall out of my chaotic rumblings of unpacking and assessing of belongings in the barn. I woke up early this morning to a mass of paper and ‘stuff’ that I had brought in from the barn, placed lovingly but haphazardly on the Airstream couch. The thought of the mess creeping in to our current home was too much to bear. So tackle it I did. And then I moved on to my file portfolio + my book drawer that needed organizing and decluttering. In with the new, out with the old. Rule #1 for me in bringing something new in to the trailer: remove an item for every item that is purchased and/or inserted. I’m feeling a bit more grounded in my ‘stuff’ in that although there is a huge amount of belongings that I own, I am more willing to part with the past and move forward (not true for everything of course, just yet anyway). The donation boxes are overflowing and I keep adding to the piles of odds and ends. You name it: clothing, books, office and beauty supplies, trinkets, house and appliance stuff, etc. No time for a garage sale, but plenty of paper purging and releasing to the gods. My gift pile is huge! I’m going to have to take make a separate entry in to my excel spreadsheet just for the gifts, so that I know what I have and am in need of releasing.
 The process of using a spreadsheet helped me immensely throughout this process. It’s been a helpful tool that eases the burden of remembering and solely sticking with emotional attachment. Once photographed in categories and documented on paper, I am able to move forward through the disorderly mess that surrounds me. It is my first belief that amidst chaos, if one is able to find clarity and resolve, true strength of character will shine brightly and the end goal will appear more defined and closer than if drowning within the mess of ones own thoughts.
 It’s always interesting when I stumble across something in my belongings that I haven’t seen or read in years. Today, I found all my skydiving logbooks, and of course, I had to glance back through them all. To my surprise, I discovered that at the end of my 2nd full logbook, I had tabulated the stats of that particular time period. Made for an interesting glimpse back on my nomadic skydiving life which I would like to share with you:
From October 1993 – January 1996 (jumps #154 − 453): I had skydived at 21 drop zones, to include 2 official demo jumps (one at an international airport and the other in to a football field) and 1 unintentional in to a K-Mart parking lot  . I had travelled through 5 American states, 6 countries (Canada, USA, Britain, South Africa, Mozambique and Kenya), attended 1 World Freefall Convention, 4 big name competitions / events (the US Nationals, Klerksdorp Nationals, World Meet ’93 and a Lake Wales World Record), 5 Boogies (Mmabatho, PPC, Arizona, Sebastian, Skydive City). The most unusual aircraft I had jumped during this time were a Luscombe, Puma helicopter and the Constellation (to date the coolest plane I have ever exited). I finagled 6 free helicopter jumps and a handful from other planes (sucks being a girl  ). Plus on top of that, I literally won a free weekend of skydiving at Deland Florida in a Christmas Raffle at Bill Booth’s annual Christmas party. It wasn’t all fun and roses though … in South Africa, I managed to impale myself on a thorn tree demoing a new-to-me canopy (I still have the scars), I sprained an ankle, slid in on my face when I flared too low, and dislocated a toe (from dirtdiving barefoot, of all things = that’s a no-no in my books now). The sum of all these experiences made for some spectacular stories early on in my skydiving career.
People used to ask me why I kept such detailed logbooks of all my jumps …. the reason, as you can see, is so that I can go back to a time in my life when the memory fails to remember such magnificent moments in history. It’s hard to capture and encapsulate such a colourful past, but logbooks certainly do help!
 Unlimited and unencumbered space is a rare treat in my world (or anyones for that matter). A good portion of our existence is spent in a 34 foot trailer, which provides many joys to our existence, but at the same time it also provides many challenges for a packrat such as myself. I’ve lived with the excuses of my nomadic life resulting in the accumulation of much girth and property over the past 20+ some years of my life. But today, here I stand amidst all of those possessions, and I’m feeling swamped and buried by the unending unearthing of hidden treasures accumulated throughout my lifetime. Almost like a history reservoir has broken and suddenly flooded my very existence with the complete past, all at once. And to think, this doesn’t include all that I need and own within the confines of our trailer and home.
The question now is, am I open to the possibility of releasing, letting go of the past, or a good portion of it? The emotional baggage that was once hidden within the unknown crevices of the cubby now stands before me as I unpack, tabulate and catalog item upon item, folded and placed on the tables reminiscent of a community garage sale. Do I love it? Do I use it? Does my home need it?
 Can you say overwhelmed? It doesn’t help when I have visitors who comment on the vastness of my possessions, saying: “You sure have a lot of stuff here. What are you going to do with it all? You surely don’t need all this!”. In fact, it stresses me beyond understanding, gnawing at me like a persistent woodpecker pecking for its prey. Thankfully, slaDE and my Father hold back their opinions and quietly watch me as I systematically begin the process of unearthing and revelation, purging and letting my spirit shine, opening like a sunflower in bloom.
As I go through this process, I sort of equate it to the planting of new seeds and the dawning of a new season. A clearing out of the old stock, re-evaluating the present moment with the past, replenishing with neat tidy seedlings of potential growth. Seasons of change.
  Beyond the confines of my mini-world exists a much larger picture of those around me. Of the valuable lessons that I continually learn from slaDE, one of the biggest messages I see ever apparent is the importance of connection with those around me, especially with those who I am blessed to love. I sometimes battle with my introverted identity. It’s super easy for me to connect via the computer with my worldly friends: I direct the amount of invested time and energy. It’s easy for me to squirrel myself away, voiding all physical contact with the world, happy and content with my own presence and company. And buried knee deep in a life’s history contained within boxes upon boxes has me mesmerized and focused on the task at hand. But I’m really making an effort to connect and remember that life exists beyond the borders of my material belongings. A family whom I haven’t visited with in over 6 months is readily available and in need of their own attention.
At this time, slaDE has his own connecting to do. A giant reawakening of mammoth proportions is about to unveil itself to him. And I applaud his courage to face the unknown fully and with every ounce of courage and integrity that he can muster. It’s been an emotional path of growth and connection that brings us forward, flourishing like the beautiful sunflowers that we are.
Today I connected with my Dad and my sister, spending quality time with them whilst my Dad received one of his health treatments. And I connected with the earth, as Dad planted crops for the season. It was a beautiful day filled with much beauty and loveliness.
  A challenging day for slaDE and myself, and our sense of patience and communication. I spent a good portion of the evening last night holed up in the cubby, shifting and organizing, trying to rein in the loose items as best as I could. But today, hubby and I clashed about my definition of containment. Although everything was basically boxed or bagged, the items were not necessarily as neat, tidy and stackable as the first round of yesterday’s entire collection of rubbermaid containers (which numbered around 40). The rest of both Aaron’s (my sister) and my stuff was haphazardly boxed, bagged or contained in a cube box or suitcase. slaDE had a vision of how he would help me. I differed somewhat in that perspective of the process of elimination. Trust me when I say that I understood how HUGE it was for slaDE to donate his time and effort in to transitioning my belongings from the basement to the barn — envision the birthing of all of my worldly stored possessions though a small hole in the wall, carted up the 20 stairs to ground level and in to an awaiting trailer, only to be offloaded and piled at the other end. I was there in the Part 1 of said process yesterday. His patience and love was unwavering and greatly appreciated. However, the conflict arose whilst I was knee deep in the muddled mess of the cubby. Tired, dusty and painfully aware of my knees and lower back, I was anxious and eager to finish the task at hand, no matter how many small trips were needed. ‘Just get me out of this claustrophobic dust hole!!!’ were my persistent thoughts. And although I believed that I was well-organized, I was drawing short on the concept that: the smaller the containment, the more the effort. So after a cool-off period for us both where I emptied and carted the jumbled mess to the awaiting utility trailer, slaDE returned to help me finish off the last of my relocation. Bless him, kind soul that he is! The truest of friends is there throughout the muck and the mire. Empty at last! Although my process has just begun, the vast void space of the cleared out cubby was a giant step towards the cleansing of my life.
Do you have a go-to friend that will be consistently there for you, through the bad and the ugly times, even knowing that those situations could stress and strain the boundaries of your friendship? I am so blessed. I have that go-to-friend, in my best friend and husband.
 After returning from the house concert late last night, with the feelings of a serious bout of flu descending upon my body, I was feeling pretty drained and reticent about starting this gigantic task. But I did feel remarkably better, and thought, if I didn’t start the task now, when would I actually ever approach it head on without reasons to procrastinate? I’ve spoken about the elusive cubby hole on numerous occasions,
So exactly, what is a cubby hole per se?
cubbyhole |ˈkəbēˌhōl|
noun
* a small, snug / enclosed compartment or room.
Dad moved in to his current house in 1995 and built the ‘cubby hole’ quite as an afterthought. The front of the house was falling in with the foundation, so my Uncle (Dad’s brother) Darrell, an architect and designer, built a sun porch to renovate that wall, and underneath, he built the cubby as an empty space to keep the porch warm in the winter. So, for as long as I’ve known Dad at this house, I have had my belongings (which were moved from a storage unit in Teeswater) neatly kept in the space underneath the patio. Since then, my many adventures of travel from country to country have rendered me with a multitude of possessions that I kept replenishing and compiling upon return from a foreign land. I never really knew what I had, as my stuff was never categorized. I’d start anew with a few basic belongings and take off for a year or 2 or more. From there, I began amassing my current endeavour of cleansing, purging and letting go. slaDE inevitably lost me to the cubby on many occasion as I rummaged, searched, reminisced for pieces of a disorganized existence. It’s been on the back burner of my brain to sort through the many boxes, but the task seemed both monumentally daunting and time consuming, along with the timing never seeming to be quite right.
 So how do I approach this most unique uncluttering task before me? I am a self-acknowledged packrat, but I am getting better (out of necessity). Living in a trailer with limited space begets that I restrain myself. Yet I’ve always had the cubby as my fallback solution of too much stuff. Letting go of favourite things (especially hard-won clothing pieces) is emotionally draining and difficult, so I’m expecting the next 10 days to be a whirlwind of tempestuous clutter-busting. Here’s to a successful cleansing and organizational session!
Sidenote: I’ve added the addendum that there will be no stress associated with the containing or quantifying of my belongings to a specific amount. Dad was very precise in saying that the space is always available for my use, and that this task at hand is not something that I needed to do. However, I want to continue with the momentum of my desire of re-discovery, but knowing that I am in control and working at my own pace makes ALL the difference of the when, how and why.
A drizzly day matching our sniffling noses (mine more from minor allergies to the pets rather than the cold that Jen is suffering from). Nice to have the option to stay warm and dry on a damp tepid morning, visiting and cooking splendid food!
As a team, we collaborated on and cooked a succulent vegetarian meal that amazed even my culinary experimentations (I rarely follow recipes, making it up as I go). Hence, the recipe that follows may not be exact to complete measurements. Add the spices to what you feel intuitively works for your taste buds!
 The Remnants of Winter Stew
- a whole butternut squash, cut into large chunks
- 6 peeled potatoes, cut into medium chunks
- 1 onion diced
- handful of mushrooms, sliced
- 3 stalks of chopped celery
- 3 cups of spinach
- 2 cups freshly cooked mung beans
- 1 can of mixed beans
- 1 can of garbonzo beans
- 1 can of whole tomatoes
- 2 tbsp each of finely chopped garlic and ginger
- chicken stock to taste
- spices: cayenne, turmeric, fenugreek, coriander seed, cumin, curry powder, pepper
- sesame oil and ghee used to fry
The onions, celery and mushrooms were fried in ghee until almost caramelized. The squash and potatoes were added and left to simmer in a cup of chicken stock for about 30 minutes. The spices were fried in ghee and then added to the potato mixture halfway through. In another pot, the tomatoes and beans were heated up, ready for the final addition of the hearty root vegetables. The spinach was added in the last few minutes in order to retain it’s textures and colour. Served with organic yogurt for a lovely finishing touch!
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