Against my will

My wife--my partner of 14 years--dramatically and suddenly left me in the summer of 2007. In a complete state of shell shock, I found myself moving into a one bedroom plus office apartment and for the first time in my life, I was alone.

No dorm sharing. Roommates. Girlfriend. Wife.

Aside from my office items and some clothing, I had surprisingly less than I had imagined--after loading the 24'foot U-Haul on cross country trip #4, my 16-foot truck seemed tiny in comparison. The apartment felt sparse to me. Barren. I finally had a place that was moderately free of clutter (or so I thought at the time)-- but the primary difference here: it was not my choice.

I was starting fresh against my will--my former spouse had purchased the majority of household items (and kept them) and so I needed to get a bedroom set, kitchen items, bath---the whole nine yards. Shopping became a form of therapy--I felt like I was replacing everything that I had "lost." Mending my wound. One couch became two again. Lamps multiplied. Rugs appeared. Debt grew.

silly me.

Buying a new toilet brush was not going to flush away the pain of my 14-year relationship coming to an abrupt end. Yet my packrat brain convinced me that if was able to physically re-gain ALL of the material items that were still at the old house--that these acquisitions would bring me some sense of closure and erase the anger, the sadness and bitterness.

And of course, like most clutterbugs...I took it to the extreme. I went out and bought a house completely beyond my means, in order to have and to hold...all the crap that bought to replace what my first wife retained. Tres stupide. Ex had a 3 bedrooms, 2 1/2 baths, full basement...so I needed the same.

And no, the madness didn't end there. My old place had a garage and a shed...and so voila! A parking pad and storage shed were purchased and erected. Ironically, when I went to purchase the shed, I originally bought the 8x8. The salesperson upsold me to an 8x10. "In all my years," he told me, "I've never had anyone come back and tell me 'I should have bought a smaller shed.' Don't worry...you'll fill it in no time." So true. Sad but true.

And so I sat in my big house. Surrounded by all my stuff. Not just the years of childhood acquired stuff, but stuff that was from move after move, house after house--and now an entirely new set of stuff that I thought I needed to fill the emotional void. And I wasn't happy. I was suffocating. The void I was trying to fill became a wider chasm each and every time I tried to put something else into it. The towel that gets wetter and wetter the more it dries. I was trying to quench my spiritual thirst with saltwater.

Next: what triggered change