Last month, I was scrolling through Pinterest, admiring some soft white and grey minimally designed spaces and thought,

Okay… that’s beautiful. So clean and elegant. But how do you do minimal? How do you get from Point A (accumulating and collecting objects) to Point B (releasing everything unnecessary)?  

I Googled “minimalism” and ended up reading the Minimalists blog. This blog made me really think about simplicity. The authors talk about being deeply happy and satisfied with the things they own.

I thought about my closet, and the piles of shabby cotton tank tops, folded and unused for years. I thought about the old discolored and bunny-chewed yoga mats, lying limp in a storage bench. I thought about the countless junk drawers/cabinets scattered throughout my home.

The authors of the Minimalists blog have tips about getting started. One idea they have is to get rid of 1 thing on the first day of the month, 2 things on the second… and so on.

I liked the idea of the challenge, but discarding 31 things in a day was not something I wanted to commit to.

I decided on an altered challenge:

Week 1: throw away 1 thing every day.

Week 2: throw away 2 things every day.

Week 3: …3 things every day.

Week 4: …4 things every day.

And I recruited a coworker. Every day, we text each other a photo of what we throw away or donate. I’m in week 4 now. Sometimes it’s easy to release things- the shabby tank tops were first to go. But sometimes, it’s painful.

I’ve tried to donate a special Free People dress around 5 times now. I can’t do it. It’s a seafoam green mesh dress, with sequins sewn in. It’s my mermaid dress, and I love it. It reminds me of the last summer I spent on Cape Cod, in my family’s summer house.

Cape Cod Gwen

Have I worn the mermaid dress in 4 years? No. But just looking at it brings me back to deck parties and suntans and cheap beer and longing for adventure and feeling like everything was possible.

I live on a dirty farm. I don’t wear dresses that require slips. I wear crocks because you can hose them off. But a part of me isn’t ready to admit that.

I don’t want to let go of Cape Cod Gwen. I don’t want to throw away my Playbill for If/Then, my rock collection, or my wand from The Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

Some objects are there to remind us of who we were and who we might still become. But not shabby tank tops, throw those bitches away.