So I’m all moved into my new summer digs.* I am happy to report that, yes, my next door neighbor is a drum teacher. Even though it’s loud, tiny children trying to play drums sounds cute reverberating through the walls. I’m trying to repress the memory of not being chosen to play the drums in 5th grade, I was told I had no rhythm and was assigned to the cello.

I’ve probably never told you, but I was classically trained in voice (10+ years), piano (10 years), and -the everhip- handbells (5 years?). Despite being all music all the time from 5-18, the only time I ever really play anything is when I come across a piano…but only when no one’s listening. I also sing a lot in the car, this has been in my repertoire a lot recently since I’ve been travelling so much…which brings back me to the recent move.

One good thing about this move is that it has forced me to limit my supplies for the summer months. Instead of having myriad craft projects to choose from, now I just have a small drawer. Instead of annoying me to no end, I’m pretty excited about the fact that this summer I will be forced to finish projects that more often than not just get rotated around and around as I float from project to project.

The once mighty craft supply area has been downsized to the tiniest it’s ever been (I’m also trying to come to terms with acrylic…)

This summer I am aiming to deal with my own materialism and excess, facing my inner packrat and breaking that unnecessary bond I have with useless things. While I was moving yesterday I went through all of the things I was bringing to the new apartment and reassessed if I really needed it, if I really was going to use it.

The bizarre thing about downsizing is that now that I’ve stored all of my non-necessary crap, I’ve been looking for gifts for other people on my frequent thrift store trips. It’s almost as if, in getting rid of all my own excess, now I just want to make all of my friends and loved ones laden as well.

Even though ebay has taken over the world, there’s nothing quite so thrilling as coming across an amazing dress or clock or painting or necklace in the dizzying racks at your local thrift store. Throughout the past decade, my wardrobe has always been augmented by charity shop/yard sale/stoop finds. While it began in the height of grunge in the early 90s, now I can’t imagine not incorporating second-hand clothes into my closet.

Although people often eschew thrift shop clothes as inferior, they often forget the most important aspects of secondhand clothes: that with a little effort you can find incredible handmade one-off pieces for next to nothing, and by supporting such shops not only are you more often than not giving back to the community but you are also recycling goods as well.

For a recent bridal shower gift, I combined a Home Ec textbook from 1951, Family Meals and Hospitality, that I found at the local Value Village bookshelf with some handknitted drawer sachets filled with lavender from an aromatherapy pillow that had long gone ignored:

This summer, I am a turtle, with all my belongings fitting in a small 4-door car. And I think I like it, becoming unfettered by boxes of unread papers and photographs of individuals whose names escape me. For the next 12 weeks, as long as my car air-conditioning works and all the windows are rolled up so I can singsingsing til my heart’s content- I’ll be good to go.

*Moving makes me grumpy. Luckily, I discovered scrawled on the side of one of my boxes by my friend Anna, Throw Rocks At Boys, written at a London post office while in a queue to mail boxes back to Chapel Hill in September. While I’m not an advocate for violence, this game was especially cathartic. Try it, you’ll see.

Also making things better is listening to SNMNMNM. But then accordions never fail to make me feel better, especially when paired with adorable lyrics.