I don't know if you can get an early Christmas present for 2026 but if you need an idea here's one. A beautiful 30 yard dumpster delivered right to the front door. I think the overwhelming feeling of loading a dumpster is getting rid of all of the stuff that keeps you weighted down each day. It's kind of like wearing a weighted vest, or a straight jacket.
And the bigger the house, were around 4,300 square feet, plus the basement and the attic, which had become the staging area for broken stuff, projects in varying degree of ideas and completion, and items and memories that should have been stored more in my head then in hand. They say when you downsize if you need to store it you don't need it.
This past weekend we had a pop-up estate sale. We had good traffic, got rid of a ton of stuff, and put some money in the wallet which will pay for this dumpster, at $750 for up to four tons, and towards Cape May, which is due May 1st. The next big item to move is the jet boat after I spend some time cleaning her up for market. The timing is good as the river rats will soon be out chasing migratory fishes.
I think before the guy turned out of our driveway Theresa and I had the first stuff hitting the metal box. Before the dumpster arrived it has been weeks of getting the property cleaned up. Sticks, leaves, downed trees, and anything else the weather and wind had deposited around the yard. One thing I can't stand is when people use their "back forty" to just drag debris out to hoping it will decompose over time. Well that takes about 100 years. So all of that stuff
had to cut up, staged, and then loaded up before being taken to the local recycling center where it'll be turned into mulch, which we'll be getting in a few weeks. There's nothing like new black mulch to pretty up around the house.
Needless to say I've checked out of this house, and New Jersey living. It's been 58 years and I'm ready for a new change, and new adventure. I'm tired of the landscape that my eyes have seen for all of these years, especially the changing landscape. The same places, the same restaurants, people, stories, politics, and the taxes. No doubt when we head south all of those things will be there, but they will be new to our eyes. And then there's adventure of something new, which can bring a new change in perspective as we crest over 60 years old. There's still a lot of life to live, and the maintenance, both physically and emotionally, of this big old house and the grind will be something I'm looking forward to leaving behind.
During the sale someone asked, "Is the pick-up for sale?". 'My pick-up too?", yep. I'm not taking this war wagon down to a 55 and over place. I told the guy I still had some work to do with it before I'd let it go for $2,500. I've been snooping around for my next vehicle, either a GMC Yukon Denali or Chevy Tahoe, which will easily tow the Jones Brothers. My thought was to tow the boat down to North Carolina and come back and sell it but I don't think it would make the trip. But I'm thinking I'll hold off on purchasing a new truck around here as anything used has had seasons of brine on the roadways or slat from the ocean spray.
So in the meantime I'll keep loading, keep teaching at the hospital, waiting for the house to be emptied out before tackling the completion of the projects left unfinished. That will include painting the house and going back to the white and brick rather than the yellowish paint scheme I started last year.
It's just easier to cover it in white as there are so many miles-foot of wood that would have to be sanded and painted the light banana color. And there's still windows that need to be removed and sanded and painted in black. When I look at the picture above, with everything grown in and in bloom, I can dollar signs, and hopefully there's a lot of them. The big question for us is to do the sale ourselves, or list it with a realtor. Paying 6% of something, which could be $50,000 is hard to swallow. It would make sense if they could prove to us they could sell it for more then we can, justifying the big commission cut.
They said we could have the dumpster for 2-3 weeks. The way we are going it might be ready for a pick up by Monday. I'm doing the Facebook Marketplace thing, the Goodwill drop-offs, and asking a friend. But in the end a lot will spend their last days in this box before getting incinerated somewhere. I'm done with stuff forever but it will be hard passing up those Yard and Estate Sales we've grown to love over the years. Maybe down south I'll spend more time in the gym rather then searching through other people's stuff before it hit's their own rented dumpster.
