The art of death cleaning

At this moment, we have two dear friends not only mourning the loss of a parent, but also tasked with going through their loved ones’ personal belongings before putting their homes up for sale. For most offspring of a certain generation, this unenviable task has become almost inevitable, filled with emotional and sometimes financial stress. Might be a good idea to start this process before we die, don’t you think? Go through your stuff now so your children won’t have to rent a Dumpster after you kick the bucket. Last week, our kind neighbor across the street, a recent widow, decided to do just that. She has a 20-yard lime green Dumpster sitting on one side of her driveway as we speak. Her kids don’t want her stuff, or their late father’s, which presumably they’ve already sorted through since his passing in 2023.

“They don’t want my crap,” she said, dripping with sweat on a particularly hot and humid August day in Michigan. “Frankly, I don’t either.”

Her two sons are fine with it, she added, as long as they don’t have to do it.

Rebecca and I threw some of our crap in there as well. Thanks, Jane.

The other night, I stumbled upon a Marie Kondo book reboot while doom-scrolling the Book of Face as Rebecca watched yet another Netflix episode of “FBI: Blindspot.” (You know, the one with a mysterious Jane Doe who is found inside a duffle bag in Times Square with no memory or clothes, and she’s covered in tattoos.)

The book’s title jumped out at me: Nobody Wants Your Sh*t: The Art of Decluttering Before You Die. It was written in 2023 by Messie Condo, who is from New Jersey and calls herself “an organizational savant and devoted swearer.”

I could seriously hang out with this woman.

Her 126-page book is about decluttering your life and home with humor and practical advice, drawing inspiration from the concept of “döstädning,” Swedish for “death cleaning.” It’s also the subject of a 2017 book called The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning by Margareta Magnusson.

“Death cleaning”? Who knew? Take control of your life, address your excess belongings, and make your life and the lives of your loved ones easier by decluttering your surroundings before you die – so that your kids won’t have to.

I have heard of “birth doulas” who offer support and guidance during pregnancy and childbirth, and even “death doulas” who provide support during the dying process – and in fact I know a very nice Canadian one – but I had not yet heard of “death cleaning.”

Remember the Japanese woman who made millions telling us how to declutter our homes and make our lives worth living again? She always wore white because it was associated with cleanliness. Bless her heart.

Yes, that was Marie Kondo, author of the 2014 best seller The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing.

Here’s a familiar Marie Kondo-ism: “Imagine yourself living in a space that contains only things that spark joy. Isn’t this the lifestyle you dream of?”

No, it isn’t. Sorry, I like order, but I am not a minimalist. I have three guitars, for goodness’ sake.

The other one, Messie Condo with a “C,” also wrote a 2020 parody book that she says will magically change your life, Tidy the F*ck Up: The American Art of Organizing Your Sh*t.

Her third book, You Can’t Take It With You: Foolproof Techniques for Tidying Up Like There’s No Tomorrow, comes out September 30.

(Aside: Is it me, or are these cleaning book titles just a tad cluttered?)

In any case, Nobody Wants Your Sh*t is my kind of book. Tongue firmly planted in cheek, Messie focuses on a painful truth: We keep too much stuff that nobody will ever want. Get rid of it and the guilt. Preserve what matters.

Here are three things I took away from Messie’s book:

• Don’t hold on to items that remind you of a moment, a person or a feeling. Dismiss the notion that your stuff is your story. You are the memory, not the souvenir. So, toss that old box on the top shelf of your closet because no one wants your stupid love letters from high school or college. Stop drowning in nostalgia.

• Eliminate the guilt and emotional baggage disguised as heirlooms. If you don’t want to keep those three crystal baskets and large horn of plenty your mother left you, then donate them to an upscale resale shop. Honoring someone’s memory doesn’t mean keeping your grandmother’s handmade lace tablecloths in a cedar chest forever either. Use them or donate them. Just don’t keep them.

• Consider decluttering a way to care for your future self. Think of yourself down the road, free from the burden of going through years and years of stuff. So freeing! You’ll rediscover a sense of purpose. Look at it as an act of kindness to yourself. Don’t just reorganize what you’ve got. Let. It. Go.

• Finally, there’s no reason you need permission to let those things go. It’s all up to you. No one else. This is your time to be empowered. What you say goes. But don’t wimp out.

My tidy parents were not collectors or hoarders and had downsized from a house to condo back in the mid-1990s. They passed away within five months of each other. We weren’t left with a messy condo, thank you.

Up until that time, my sisters and I often helped our meticulous mother declutter the condo’s closets and cupboards. Dad was a neat freak and didn’t accumulate much in his “man cave/office” corner of the basement.

Getting rid of your parents’ stuff has become a rite of passage for adult children. My mother did it for her parents. We did it for ours. But no one’s going to do it for me since I have no children that I know of.

It’s all up to me. I know one thing, however. If Messie Condo says I’m entitled to keeping all of my sweatpants, they’re staying put. Until I croak.

(YouTube audio only: Here’s Betty Wright singing her 1971 hit “Clean Up Woman” from her second studio album, “I Love the Way You Love.” Favorite lyric: “So take a tip, you better get hip/To the clean up woman ’cause she’s tough/I mean, she really cleans up.” Wright died of cancer on May 14, 2020, at her home in Miami. She was 66.)