What's Left Behind?

Clothes make the man.....
                                       
Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend.....
                                                                                             
He who dies with the most toys wins.....

Those little homilies ran through my head as I walked through a lake-front mansion. This was an estate sale that contained the belongings of someone who had obviously lived a financially privileged life.

 
The house sat on three and a half acres of manicured lawns facing the lake; the grounds were dotted with stone terraces and a jewel of an in-ground pool.
 

 I stood looking up at a house that I would guesstimate held twenty five rooms; the huge, etched glass doors invited me in.   As I wandered around I discovered most of the rooms boasted a beautiful, unobstructed, view of Lake Erie. The tag sale was winding down, but some very expensive furnishings still sat in many of the rooms. Tables full of beautiful decorative pieces and monogrammed items, left behind by a man or woman who wouldn’t need them any longer, occupied much of the floor space.

 
It seems that shopping has become our national pass time; we all seem to think what we own is really important. But what can we determine about an individual by the earthly things they have left behind? It was easy to assume this person had enjoyed a pretty healthy bank account at some point in his/her life. Judging by the electric lift chair on the stairs this person’s health may have deteriorated to the point that climbing the beautiful winding stairs was out of the question.

The olympic sized pool remained covered and unused; the hot tub being sold looked as if it, too, had not been enjoyed in a very long time.  The footprint of this house was huge, but one small room in particular was time worn.  It occurred to me that the majority of this person’s days might have been spent there instead of the elegant living room with the sweeping view of the water.  A gourmet kitchen held the most expensive appliances, but the worn out electric fry pan and a dented tea kettle told the story of a person who likely only ate out of necessity. This house had once been a show place, and I'm sure it will be again….but the small details hinted at a very quiet, perhaps lonely, finish to someone’s life.

 A life lived in elegant surroundings; that’s what these things said about their previous owner. But, more importantly, what they did not say spoke volumes. These belongings said nothing about the owner’s heart and soul. There were no comfortable nooks that spoke to the joy of watching the sun rise and set on the lake, no happy faces shining from the expensive picture frames.  Perhaps those personal things had been removed; perhaps they never existed. 

Some of the items seemed to have been collected during travels to foreign countries; maybe brought to this house by a traveling work-a-holic or a happy leisure traveler. Nothing in these things that were being picked over by strangers told me very much about their true owner.   Still and all, the real message was clear:  No matter how much stuff we accumulate, we all die.

I love quotes and snappy sayings. The problem with catchy little phrases is that, while they may scratch the surface of the truth, but they do not penetrate very far.

Clothes do not make the man…I remember my dad’s hugs as he gathered me up in his arms wearing his scratchy work shirt.

 

Diamonds are not a girl’s best friend…a loving spouse, a loyal friend, a caring family; these are jewels.

 

He who dies with the most toys wins is not true at all.    My grandparent’s most prized possessions were their bibles. Both books are dog eared, with passages underlined, scripture and comments in the margins.  They are rich with their thoughts and beliefs, snippets of baby hair, a card from a beloved friend’s funeral, a column cut from a church bulletin.

When I die my loved ones can divide the number of days I have lived by the value of the things I leave behind...and they will learn nothing from doing the math. Some things just don't add up.

 

                                                                       Life is Good