Yard sale and looking forward

On Saturday, TWIL and I held a yard sale with the idea that we were clearing the cellar and raising money for the wedding. We slept poorly and got up early.

I got rid of a set of mixing bowls - the first this avid cook bought after he left the monastery (that's another story). I offered up a set of silverware that I bought when I moved into this house alone. And she gave up her blender and a collection of good framed prints. It's the stuff of two households. "Well, when you leave me...," I joked, "you're going to need those," all the while comforting myself that the bowls were still there. There were times when I salivated to live alone again. But in fact I feared that she'd find me out. She'd be right to leave. I'm not as good as she thinks I am. That's never changed.

What I can tell you is that we parted with most of the stuff as a burden being lifted. People were happy to hear they were supporting our wedding. As one shopper said, "Well this is a nice change. Usually I'm picking through the wedding gifts because..., well, you don't want to hear that!" The furniture that we couldn't sell by 1 p.m., we labeled "Free." Edi and Candace, the kind of friends you'd wish for but wouldn't find, helped us carry two carloads of orphaned objects to the Salvation Army. When we four finished lunch, the furniture was gone.

Five years ago, TWIL called me from Washington as I headed home from the shuttered office building where I worked in Boston's financial district. She could see the smoke rising from the Pentagon. The cell phone networks were overwhelmed for hours before I could talk with her again. We were just glad to know the other was there and safe. So little seemed solid that day and every day that followed. Everything except her.