Anyone who lives in a NYC apartment knows what we covet most is closet space. I listened in awe as a friend and sister tenant shared her minimalist approach. "I save nothing. Discard everything. I could sublet my closet space." With her voice in my head, I entered my own apartment determined to purge and declutter. Long story short. Didn't happen. Not happening in this lifetime but Why??? Why can I not part with objects and possessions that are not essential to my every day existence?

Growing up, my world was divided into an Upstairs/Downstairs dichotomy. We lived in a two family home but did not rent the lower three and one half room apartment. The upper level living space was exquisitely appointed and reflected my mother's  impeccable taste. The downstairs was my father's horders paradise. He was incapable of parting with a newspaper and so unfolded pages were piled high dating back decades. I never had to go to the library for a research project. Among the ruins were paper clips, shoe laces, batteries,  subway tokens, functioning and non-functioning gadgets, clothing in bins, a crawl space filled with broken toys and dusty tattered furniture from past residences decorating homes from before my birth. How to explain what for my sisters and me filled us with wonder. The explanation simply was "Daddy is a product of the depression" This meant he survived the nation's chapter when because of The Wall Street Crash everything was taken from him and his family. The trauma of living in poverty and losing everything resulted in the inability to part with anything.

When my dad died suddently at fifty eight, my mother arranged for all that he had accumulated to be disposed of. That included his cherished books and some of my research papers, letters and poetry from friends and boyfriends. I was devastated. My mother's unapologetic explanation was, "If they meant so much to you, you should not have left them when you got married." Truth be told, I could not even remember when was the last time I had revisited my childhood crushes through these precious momentos. Yet, coming to terms with their unannounced abrupt departure filled me with anguish. My insensitive mother had vanished my adolescence to the garbage heap. To this day, I mourn their unceremonious departure. Yes, I felt the irretrievable pages of my life had been ripped out of my evolving biography.

I remember having to adjust to the realization that unlike my ancestral home, my first apartment shared with my husband was not stocked with enough office supplies to make a Staples jealous. My dad's horder's paradise was the original google; the forerunner of Jeopardy. It may have contained all the answers in the universe . You just had to figure out the question and don a miner's hat to search among the ruins my father considered treasure, for your enlightenment.  My newlywed abode held no such mysteries.

And so decades later, here I am trying to free myself from what I have accumulated over the years because my maternal DNA knows I will breathe easier when unencumbered. I can hear my organized "Everything in it's place and a place for everything," mother willing me to part with all that is not necessary. "Throw out the clothes and shoes you no longer wear. Get rid of the products you don't use. Don't keep your educational resources,lessons plans, or college recommendations for your students. Force Richard to part with all the office memorabilia he brought home."

"But Mom, what about your nightgowns, robes and slippers I brought home from your final hospital stay? I know I will never wear them but they make me feel a part of you is still with me. How can I part with the milk vase you bought when you were in long labor with me and instructed to walk in the  Beth El lobby? What about the newpaper clippings of daddy as a young rabbi and resident psychologist  of the orphanage where you two met and my story began? What about the boys' Mothers' Day cards and all of Jason's letters to me from Williams? There are of an era gone by and allow me to time travel to before circumstances would alter relationships and that idyllic existence would be relegated to a blurred college campus. Is my fear that if I discard them then what they document never really happened?

Of course, I think about the opposite effect. My sisters and I both laugh and lament the criminal dearth of photos of us growing up. Granted that was the pre-selfie era and it appears my parents either never owned cameras or chose not to chronicle family life in pictures. The lasting result is none of the three sisters quite remember what we looked like at various stages. Those are painful and irretrievable gaps. You would think given this photographic oversight, I would be all about "the pose." Yet, I find myself wanting to soak up and live in the moment; to be totally present and so often the moment passes without forever documentation. Once again, I come back to the realization that I am a product of both my parents and my life reflects grappling with their contrasting personalities and values. it is a neverending push/pull to be at peace with my decisions.

I remember a psychologist saying that,"an organized closet is the sign of a healthy and ordered life" Certainly, those who have spacious homes and ample storage space have the luxury of clinging to relics of the past and possessions of sentimental value without sacrificing the sense of balance.

I need to follow up my conversation with my minimalist friend because I crave the answer of how a person is able not to become overly attached to objects, possessions and signifiers of ones emotional life. Are these inseparables? Are they infact our security blankets; our adult pacifiers that keep us secure in our selective historical snapshots? Do they serve to validate us? Are we more alive because they keep our memories from fading over time? What is our fear if we part with these symbolic trinkets? If we consciously discard them what does it say about what we value and who we are?

And  even if I, with the best of intentions ,determine to declutter and divest myself of all of these vestigial possessions---I can envision the scenario. I will be rereading and savoring every line of every card my family has sent sprawled out among my mother's robes and fluffy slippers-drowning in tears. Rather than shredding or discarding--they will be returned to my overstuffed armoire.....

Someone a lot wiser and less sentimental than I needs to teach me how you forfeit parts of yourself