This morning, Morgan came over early. After breakfast, he helped me by bringing empty boxes out to the kitchen where I went through the dishes cupboard.

When we moved to New England in 1983, I'd never been so far apart from any of my family, esp. my mom. She knew I'd always loved white-speckled blue enamelware, the kind only found in camping stores back then. Our second Christmas in New England, she sent us a set of those dishes and I was over the moon. We had a beautiful Christmas breakfast, and later, supper, using those dishes. I was so pleased and proud of how pretty they looked and so grateful to my mom.

Until today, we still had those dishes, but rarely used them any more. With just Rog and I, we use more paper than anything else. So there they sat, in the cupboard, taking up space, but well-loved and I was reluctant to let go of them. I've been thinking about them all week.

This morning, I loaded them all into a box which Morgan provided, along with some vases and other things I decided to let go of...Rog loaded two over-filled boxes into the car for us. Then, he and Morgan put all of the aluminium cans in a trash bag, I grabbed two packages to be mailed and off we went.

We first went to Kmart to return a towel and shorts which I didn't like, then on to the health food store for more of our fav. coconut bars, then down Main street to see the new water feature. It is so neat! A big square filled with small outlets for water which sprays up. Open for kids to frolic and others to get their feet wet, at least. After that we went looking for the place to take the cans for recycling. Took a bit, but we found it. Morgan got $1.20 for what he'd collected. Everything he collects, he gives to the humane shelters. So, after that, we went to one of the shelters which has a store and dropped off the boxes of stuff. We also went in to see the kittens they had and Morgan gave them a donation of $5 which was from his wages for this week. Then, we went to the other humane shelter where he gave a donation of $4, the rest of his wages and his can money. It was pretty neat. When we got out to the car, he told me he felt really good about giving to help the pets.

By that time, it was past lunch, I was hungry, but we still needed to stop at the post office. He went in for me to get the mail and dropped off the stamped packages. Then, we got lunch and came home. Phew!

Didn't make it to exercise and the hand therapist was out sick, today, but I think I got plenty of movement anyway! Sure feels good to see the neatly almost empty cupboard and to have done all of the other stuff, too. Although, now that I think of the dishes, I do feel kind of sad, but a good sad, if that makes any sense. I think my mom would understand.