For more than a year one of our SOS Organizers, Sandy, has been working with a client wanting to make her things more manageable. Like many people in today’s society Becky felt overwhelmed when her possessions began taking over her living space. Becky resides in a beautifully restored Victorian-style home in a small town outside of Iowa City. During their time together, Sandy and Becky have worked on creating order in many areas of the home, including the offices, basement, guest rooms and attic.
Becky’s retirement has allowed her to focus more fully on her wealth of talents and hobbies. She enjoys spending time playing her piano and yukalaylees, as well as making the most exquisite beading for jewelry. To say Becky is cultured would not do her justice. Early into her golden years, Becky has accomplished many great things in her lifetime. She was an activist in the civil rights movement, lived on a commune in the South and as a career, provided respiratory therapy for hundreds of children.
Becky’s passion for education is apparent. She has studied medicine, religion and philosophy. Her interests are numerous and her knowledge unmatched. She speaks of the moments in her past with a passion so raw you can see the story play out in her eyes.
Becky also crusaded against a debilitating disease that ravaged her family. Huntington’s disease took the lives of many of her family members and for years Becky feared her fate would be the same. Thankfully, it was not and she has gone on to live a life of great purpose. The accomplishments of her lifetime are things many of us only dream of achieving.
Her attic, located on the third floor of the home, serves as a type of home library. The walls are lined with shelves allowing for hundreds of books to be displayed. Becky realized the need to scale down her collection, but found the process rather difficult. Many of the books held sentimental value, some having been in her possession since childhood, making them nearly impossible to give up. Many of the books also included college texts and travel books detailing the many places Becky and her husband had visited.
While she had ample shelving possibilities, the need was still apparent to group the books by topic, sort through them and discard the unwanted. The seemingly large project overwhelmed both Becky and Sandy. They knew what had to be done, yet were unsure where to begin…
So one bright Summer morning, I joined Sandy on the trip out to Becky’s house. Having been a devout reader since about age 7 or 8, Sandy knew my appreciation for books would calm Becky’s apprehensions and allow us to proceed with the project. What follows are photos detailing our progress:
Our work area: the main part of the attic we designated for book sorting.
Another view from a few steps back. Our plan was to sort books by topic, let Becky decide between the “Keep” and “Go” piles and depending on her choice, return them to the shelves or bag them.
We separated the books by type, finding that the general majority of books included: religion, history, philosophy or self-help.
View of the back half of the attic. Many of the shelves were cluttered with several different types of books, with no rhyme or reason for their placement. See if you can find Mugsy, one of Becky’s dogs, who snuck into the picture!
As we began to take the discarded books from Becky’s home we found many of the options we had considered for selling them fruitless. We had hoped that used bookstores and antique shops would be interested in Becky’s books, but found many of them fell between too-outdated and not old enough. Discouraged, but not entirely dissuaded we found a local consignment store willing to take the majority of the books. The rest, per Becky’s request, were donated to Goodwill and the Iowa City Public Library. Happy to be creating some space, Sandy and I continued to take bags and bags of books from Becky’s attic. Sometimes visiting two times a week, we would have successful days, followed by not so successful days.
Still in the process, we continue to attempt to persuade Becky towards the “Less is more” mantra and work to find the best possible option for selling Becky’s books. More pictures to come. Stay tuned.
