Catch up here – Goods Of The Dead
Aquamarine, turquoise, teal. When I see these colors, I think of Aquarius though some astrologers give them to Pisces.
When I bought our bedroom set (from the daughter of the deceased couple who owned it), the entire house was decorated in teal. This struck me because I’d just purchased an aquamarine-colored couch.
Most people don’t buy aquamarine couches so I mentioned this to the gal I was buying the bed from. I liked her from the moment I saw her. I agreed to buy the bedroom furniture that day.
When I came back to pick the stuff up (with two men and two trucks), they had it all wrapped in plastic for me. As it turned out we did not bring quite enough padding. That’s when this gal decided to give me her mother’s rugs (runners).
I realized at that point, she liked me as much as I liked her. I went home with the rugs and sent her back this picture…
You see how well the rug matches our Cleopatra. You can’t make this stuff happen on it’s own. Basically, her (just deceased) mother and I have the same taste.
This gal and I have been in contact since. See that zodiac picture?
That’s my necklace, displayed on my vintage coat from the 1950’s. I forgot about that coat. But when I unpacked it, I snapped a picture of it and asked her what her mother would think of it…
I may buy some more of her mother’s stuff, I don’t know. The daughter is grieving. It’s best she mull it over. I’m not going anywhere.
But I feel her mother’s presence exists here, don’t you? Her stuff is not gone, it’s moved.
Most of all, it’s loved and cared for.
Would it matter to you, who buys / gets your loved one’s things?
I wouldn’t matter to me, so long as the will is followed through. Material possession is not something I feel strongly about.
Speaking of dead people’s things, I seem to always wind up with them. I bought my recent car from a deceased elderly man, and furnished my place with furniture from an older couple that passed away. I’m literally sitting in the rocking recliner that now “belongs” to a dead person.
My terrible joke starts with, “I love it when old folks die….because they leave behind amazing stuff.”
Would it matter to you, who buys / gets your loved one’s things?
In my case, it mattered more to my recently departed mother than it does to me. As to her will, it states I am to decide the disposition of personal items. Scorpio brother and I (Cap) led her into that direction. If our Libra mother listed everything, the will would never have been completed. As is, she never finished the list I made for her. I appealed to her Libra “helping me” to get it partially completed.
Again, it is my task to disperse her belongings. My siblings will help. We’re going to try to keep as much as possible in the family. Scorpio brother has requested no auction, if possible, as it’d be too emotional.
And, nobody wants the china. The grandson that’s getting the china cabinet was told he had to take the china, too!!
It reminds me of when people adopt children and the adopted children actually look like their new parents. Like it was meant to be — those children were meant to be the children of those particular parents. That’s how I see this stuff that you bought from the young woman who lost her mother. You were meant to be the new mother of her stuff. And I think she approves!!
I am certain that the daughter of the departed woman takes great comfort in having found someone whom would value and treasure the things that were important to her mother. It is a healing part of the grief process when you are able to place cherished things of your departed mother with someone who gets why they are great. It is also very healing to have those things reside elsewhere so as to not be the constant reminder of the loss. As a woman losing your Mother deeply affects you regardless of the relationship you had with her it is a complicated bag of tricks and Elsa every time I read one of your accounts of receiving this departed woman’s things I “feel” the content relief of the daughter who has honored her Mother’s cherished possessions while giving herself space to close her fresh wounds of her loss. It is a win-win story every time.
This subject is highly emotive for me (8th house sun and merc – 12th house stellium too)I don’t care about the possessions much but that the person behind counts and is loved, remembered, cherished after death is deeply moving. I lost my mum 8 years ago and I don’t know how others cope with loss but for me – minus the shock of losing her suddenly – it’s just as painful. I can’t ‘get over it’, she taught me love, how could I forget her? Because of her every death is deeply meaningful and heartfelt. I veered off the point …. the goods of the dead for me are secondary but I know people who are deeply attached to the possessions of their loved ones who have passed away. My sister has a shrine of my mother’s items. I live abroad so I just have her photos, prayer book and one religious painting.
It’s not just my frugality and aesthetics that make me love thrift shops and estate sales, it’s also the idea that someone’s treasured possessions find new homes where they will be treasured again, plus the re-use of resources rather than waste. This is wonderful for all involved.
As I have no heirs, mine will eventually end up in a charity thrift shop where I hope they will not only benefit the cause but also give some joy to a new owner.
I have items in my kitchen that I use every day. I have a blue bowl and each time I use it I picture my dear friend arranging things in it. When another friend died a few years ago I brought home with me a couple of the tea cloths (drying cloths) from his house. I have a lot of items around here that came to me when someone in my life died. They are of no monetary value but mean a lot to me.
To get back to Elsa’s story – I think it must be a great comfort for the daughter to meet you and to be reminded of her mother’s tastes.
It matters to me. I have been given several pieces of my great-grandmother’s furniture. She bought, over time, after coming to the USA at age 16. Beyond the wood and fabric, I feel her determination and independence. Hopefully it will continue to inspire as the years go by.
The other day I wrote that my only prized possessions are my photographs, letters and books. Not true. I also value the painting I collaborated on with my son and the antique French bed my maternal grandmother gave me. She inherited it from her French grandmother. When I was a child I would spend the night with my grandmother in that bed. She would tickle my back and read fairy tales to me. I want my son to get the bed and the painting when I’m gone. I love that you associate turquoise with Aquarius.
Interesting.
I used to think my writing had value (to my kids) but no longer do. There is too much of it, for one thing.
I definitely see the color and think, “Aquarius”. I used to have an Aquarius friend who wore a chunky turquoise bracelet draped around her ear. She could pull this off, lol.
I remember reading about your Aquarius friend. I love that! I tried making turquoise jewelry when I lived in New Mexico. The other night I added real chunks of turquoise to a mixed media painting.
A couple things…
That teal/turquoise color was a big favorite of my grandmother’s (Aries Sun). When she passed, she had several large Oriental rugs made in that color that now lay (or lie? I always mix them, my apologies) on the floor of my mother’s house. My grandmother loved Asian accents…her expensive black mahogany dining set that we children were never allowed to touch had beautiful sideboards and china cabinets with the gold inlay. She had a huge panel of painted koi fish on gold that took up entire walls of whichever home she lived in…I loved it, it was always so beautiful. SO that color instantly reminded me of her and when she passed.
When my grandmother passed 5 years ago, my mother called me and asked me what of her stuff I wanted. I was kind of taken aback at the unemotional nature, the business like attitude. It turned me off, honestly. It felt dirty. She wasn’t even buried and I was being asked what should my mother set aside for me. I honestly didn’t want anything, but she kept pressing me. So then I finally relented and thought of a small white side table that she used to keep all the photos of my grandfather and her (they were married over 50 years, she ran away from home to marry him, it was a whirlwind romance, her family disowned her for a while). I also asked for a rosary. Then my mother told me about everything my sisters and my aunt had already claimed. I was again shocked…I don’t understand it.
How can you sit there and go through someone’s things when they are not even buried and say “I want this, this and this”…? I’m sure everyone copes with grief differently, but…I can’t imagine it being like this when I pass.
Welll. I am realizing that accumulating items that are very personally meaningful to me is kindof an ongoing issue for me.
I have 2nd house moon opposite 8th house jupiter and I (along with my uninterested brother) are the children of only children. So as my grandparents died all their stuff came to me. When my mom died, I got all the stuff my dad couldn’t bear to have around the house. So many one of a kind artifacts, mysterious treasures, sentimental objects chock full of memories. And I would keep each one if I could. Schedule weekly tours through the storage units and the garage to peruse it all. Put my hands on every trivial piece like I was Smaug or Scrooge McDuck in his swimming pool of money.
The things make me feel like I know who I am. But I can’t keep it all. My husband is horrified by the volume of items. We are getting rid of it box by box, all but the most important. Sometimes I feel like I just can’t do it. Like I’m throwing away the moments of my ancestors lives. I mean I don’t need my grandmother’s hand mixer. But are the cumulative hours she spent using it not worth remembering? Are they not more essentially important than the moments she spent posing for significant family photos? But then I think about my North node in the 8th and how going through this personal sacrifice is a holy quest of transformation. Maybe when it’s over I will have transcended the need for all this stuff and made space for an identity beyond my anscestry.
In the decluttering book I got, one of the reasons people collect things is for momentos. They said the best way to deal with it is take a picture of it!
For example, take a picture of the hand mixer vs. keeping the hand mixer.
It’s less bulky than keeping the hand mixer and you get to keep the memory behind the hand mixer.
Anyways, just a suggestion if you’re having trouble decluttering momentos, and you’re not completely offended/horrified by the thought.
Well, I hope that all things go to a home where it is appreciated and loved.
I don’t like having stuff around that’s in storage or not used. I feel like the items are being neglected. Some of it is new or like new. It feels like someone could take care of it and appreciate it better than I can… so I start giving it away.
Guess that’s Venus in Virgo aspecting Pluto for you. I can’t stand having stuff laying around unused.
No. They can have it as we speak.
All that “stuff” had such meaning for so long and now it’s just stuff.
The journey is becoming the treasure.
I just spent a few days with my mother, to give her a break from caring for my stepfather who is 91. With her it’s always been her jewellery she wants me to have. She has a solid gold i.d. / medical emergency bracelet with the caduceus on it (Mercury). It’s not pretty but valuable. She told me to look out for it, as my stepbrother, well let’s say we don’t trust him come the time. He’s a Gemini like my own brother they are only 2 weeks apart. And live close by, while I live a few hours away. It’s not nice to consider but my mother is practical and we almost enjoy talking about it weirdly, like its a comfort to both of us. She’s a Pisces with her Jupiter in my first house (progressed 2nd?) so we know it’s going to happen. Why not be prepared?
All of a sudden she (and the Queen she noticed, who is a similar age) started wearing colour a few years ago. I wondered if her progressed rising sign maybe changed, she started wearing a lot of red and black, very Mars colours. She chose a bright red car to drive. I love it, being very Mars myself! I want that car and am going to finish my lessons so I can buy it from her in a few months. I asked why she started wearing bright colours, she said, ‘well no-one cares what I look like at my age so I thought, so what? I may as well be bright’. Brilliant. She is the light of my life.
Yes, it would matter to me. I have and 8th Sun(chart ruler) moon and mercury. I wouldn’t feel comfortable giving my mother or my fathers things to any stranger. I would have a real hard time giving or selling them to anyone. It would honestly disturb me to the core.
Hi, Elsa. I was wondering what colors you do attribute to Piscis?
Sea green and violet. 🙂
Cool, sea green also. I hadn’t clicked the violet aspect though.
Like this?
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=alcest&iax=1&ia=images&iai=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thesirenssound.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2009%2F07%2FAlcest.jpg.
„Would it matter to you, who buys / gets your loved one’s things?“
Yes, very much. That girl was very lucking for having run into you.