My closets are full of clothes. Most of them I don’t wear. I just work around them while fitting new items in on empty hangers. But every now and then I do an overhaul and pick through the clothes one by one to see which ones I can – and will – part with. It’s usually a very difficult experience, one during which I procrastinate endlessly.

“Why is it so hard?” ask friends who hear me complain. It’s not really about the time it takes for me to sift through the cottons, linens and wools, the florals, stripes and plaids; it’s about the memories of the stages of my life.

There are the clothes I’ve saved because I hoped one day I’d fit back into them. You know that semi-delusional outlook that by some miracle I’d lose weight as I aged. My college jeans. My harem pants in green, white and red, with the drawstring waist and buttoned ankles. The tight little dresses that looked great on a 25-year-old figure. And the ones that looked darn good on a 38-year-old figure. Now it would be a miracle if I could fit a straight jean dress over my child-bearing hips. So I’m left with the ability to outfit several different women – sizes 8, 10 and 12.

But those are the clothes I can usually part with – little by little. Each time I engage in the closet cleaning process I tenderly place a few items in a crisp brown paper bag for ‘someone less fortunate.’ But realistically, they’re for someone 45 pounds lighter. Through the process of selection there’s always a few I keep – just in case I drop a size, or two.

Then there are the clothes that I know I’ll never wear again. But they have sentimental value. The clothes that were gifts or belonged to someone else that ended up in my closet. And yes, those are a little more difficult to part with.

My communion dress. My first boyfriend’s green army shirt that he wore in Vietnam, with his name tag in its left pocket. The rust shirt I wore the day I first made love. My grandmother’s hand-made aprons that not only don’t fit me, but are falling apart after 60 years of hanging in closets. My mother’s sequined dress that she and I both wore in our twenties. And Sheila’s green cotton t-shirt which I keep folded in the back of my drawer. Each time I lift it, I hear her laughter in happier days – before she committed suicide.

Those clothes will stay with me forever. And one day when I’m gone, someone cleaning my closets will curiously give them a once-over, then toss them with no regard into a brown paper bag. But not me. Those clothes represent my life. The people I’ve loved. The people who’ve left. I don’t have the heart to bury them in a pile of trash.

They represent love. They deserve love.

(c) SeptemberMom 2013