clean up

Tonight Charlie and I were in the front yard cleaning up all the sticks and branches that had fallen during a particularly violent thunderstorm over the weekend and suddenly I got really mad. I wasn't mad because this was a job I wasn't able to do because, clearly I was doing it. I wasn't angry because I didn't want to do this job because it was actually quite pleasant being out there in the dusky twilight - my favorite time of the day.

My reason for being mad didn't even make sense, I was just pissed because this was a job that Taz would have done without even thinking twice but I was doing it because he wasn't there to do it. It still hits me hard, especially when I'm doing something that he would normally have done.

Just like it just about killed me when I finally cleaned out the freezer of food that I was never going to eat, that was getting freezer burn because it had been there since our October Costco trip. At this point, even if I wanted to eat it, it wouldn't taste good. I had been promising myself for WEEKS that *this* was the weekend I would clear that stuff out. Well, this past weekend finally was THE weekend. But it was so sad, I felt like I was betraying Taz by throwing his food out and I had to fight with myself not to stuff it all back in the freezer. I won the fight...or did I lose?...and it all went out with the garbage and was picked up and gone by the time I got home from work on Monday. The hardest thing to throw out was the french bread. He loved french bread so much but always complained  he couldn't get a really good baguette here in the US. Every once in a while Publix would make some that were adequate so he would treat himself to a baguette. He loved it so much he could easily eat a whole baguette in one day so he rationed himself by cutting it up and freezing it. There was a whole bag of it in the freezer that he had just put there in early November. And now it's gone. Everything is gone. Every.Damn.Thing.

 The big argument I'm having with myself currently is whether or not to move the shoes. It's not like there isn't precedence for leaving a loved one's things where they left them. Taz and I left Jasper's bed out for over 2 years and we (damn it, I guess I mean *I*) still have a rawhide bone and tennis ball here in this house, just like Jasper left it when we moved away in 2011. The shoes aren't hurting anybody, they are not in the way...but what's the point of leaving them there? I could leave them there for the rest of my life and they aren't going to work any magic. They will never be worn again. And yet, I like seeing them there so that's reason enough to leave them for now.

And we're not even going to talk about the clothes, not yet, I just can't.

Cleaning up what's left behind is a shitty job.