Many if not most may think this is morbid but I think it’s interesting for some reason and also having to do with love. I was sitting here looking around before I wrote the Rotting Home post and I had a random thought cross my mind. If I were to die tonight, what would people think when they came in my home? What would my home tell them about me?
As it turns out, it would not tell them much. Everything in this house (belonging to me) is absolutely discardable other than my pictures. The house is not very clean; I’m an old lady so really you could just cart me away and there would be nothing remarkable about it. I am just the kind of person you would have had to know.
As soon as I thought that, I realized this was true of most people. You have to know them to know how incredibly important their life was. The people they touched.
I feel okay about this because I understand it. There are people who die; if you were to go into their house, you’d want to preserve things. You’d want to own them. The things have value. But I turned out like, Henry.
When Henry died (Death and Lemonade), I was responsible for cleaning out his house. While it was a horrible job and a tremendous amount of work, he was like me. Everything he had belonged in the dump. His legacy was his writing. His pictures were pretty spectacular and I am here because of him as well.
That’s my grandfather’s picture. Would you not have liked to have known that man? Well you’d never know it from his stuff, okay?
We’re desert philosophers really, though I do have a red gun.
If you were to die, what would what you left say about you?
This woman loved her kids, wished she lived on the ocean, and really liked Disney World – especially Tinkerbell!
Pretty much everything I own is worthless. There are things that are special to me but once I’m gone, they wouldn’t amount to much. I try to cultivate things that are of lasting worth but it’s not something I can do very well. My mother strives to have things worth treasuring. Lovely art, pictures, some antiques like glassware, things given to her by relatives, meant to be passed down and beloved.
This reminds me of one of my college friends. She lost her father at a very young age and her mother at the age of 19. She was left responsible for her entire childhood home’s worth of memories and she is still going through everything room by room 4 years later. Sometimes she will post old pictures her father took on Facebook, or take pictures of her mother’s things. I cant even imagine having to do that. She has significant 8th house planets and a Scorpio moon.
That’s bizarre, just an hour ago I was thinking what would happen to my computer if I died. Who would read all my emails and find other stuff… Wow.
A movie comes to mind: “Three Colours: Blue”. A guy died in a car crash with his daughter, and his wife finds out that he had a mistress who’s pregnant with his child.
I saw that movie for the first time when I was 14 or so and it really affected me. I always, always think of “what’s left after I die” in terms of – would there be an ugly secret that would hurt someone? Not that it helps to lead a “clean” life, maybe a little…
That I have no home.
98% of what I own is packed up, scattered amongst my parent’s homes. What isn’t in a box is fairly unimportant, though I would hope that whoever had to clean up would sell my old Barbie collection — at last value they were worth about $10k (and, no, I’ve never made the list and checked current values so I can sell them).
And that I liked reading and music. I think that’s fairly obvious from my belongings. 🙂
Great question Elsa. I wouldnt have much that would be of value excpet maybe my bed, my piano, some rare piano scores, my flute and my VSL (music software) other than that I believe im the kinda of person you would have to know.
My stuff would probably say I was a lover of music and books, because thats all I have in room, books and music. My computer would probably say the same thing 🙂
That I liked books and radio stuff and religion and shoes.
And animals liked me and I was loved and knew a lot of writers.
For a lot of this pluto transit I’ve been working on organizing stuff/getting rid of stuff so it won’t be a burden to anyone if I went.
But I’m slow so it looks like crap in here when I have everything out. Will be done by the end of the summer though.
My stuff would tell you I didn’t own much, a few things of resale value, a few things of sentimental value. My books and music would reveal a glimpse, but my journal and photographs would tell my story.
(((Jilly))) I know it sounds weird, kinda, but that’s inspiring to me.
Geez… Pluto much? 😛
Mine would show I traveled a lot but loved home.
Jilly … I don’t think it’s what you say or even how you say it but who you are that comes through with such graciousness.
Yes … You know what’s important …. Pluto much? 🙂
ROFL. That I did/made things. I seem to have tools, but only the ones that keep getting used. There is art, but it is my mother’s drawings or my aunt’s paintings. Plants, lots of plants. And books on how to do things 😀
I guess my house says that I’m very very practical. Or as my husband calls me “competent” (sneaking feeling he’s right). My house is comfy, not neat as a pin clean, but big old couches, plants, some art, always a spot to put your food and drink when you sit and talk. (awesome bit – pick up old wood chairs on trash day, break off the backs, glue what needs gluing and paint to the color you like. Makes an excellent side table/plant stand/ drink/food holder) Everything is usable and in use with seasonal rotation (rugs go down in the winter for warmth and get picked up for the summer) I don’t have or keep much “extra” or sentimental stuff. Clothes are either worn or go bye bye, same for most everything including kitchen items.
My father, on the other hand will be known by his house when he dies. You don’t even need to walk into it to know who he was. He, and my mom, built it themselves and it is.. distinctive and ahead of it’s time. It is an example of “what can be” and the structure itself screams beauty and practicality from the outside.
Hard to say. Some of the (I think) most interesting bits about me are ephemeral at best. Couple with a habit/penchant for secretiveness and privacy in some things-well, there you go.
Luckily, I’m a bit too immersed in my immediacy to spare more than a glancing worry to its impression on those to come.
That I loved music and photography. That I held on to clothing from special times.
That I traveled, loved murder mysteries and metaphysics books. That I loved my family heirlooms and antiques.
my books are organized by favoritism and beyond that genre, male and female. My albums are in order of genre. My trinkets are all slid to their position of mirroring another trinket. Photographs of my mother litter the mantel. The religious paintings that hung on my grandfather’s wall until his death now hang on mine. art and writing fills every drawer except those lined with precisely folded laundry. organized seasonally, of course.
Scorpio Sun and stellium in the tenth house. Venus in Scorpio straddles my midheaven.
Wow…we never knew she had so much going on in there ….she loved her internal space and was happy as a clam there….Scorpio Sun, Moon & Mercury….4th house…
Hi Elsa,
Good musings you got here.
Hmmm… As for me, I am still working on the calling of my true node which is to leave a legacy while being nice and sweet.
Thank you for this inspiration.
Well if this was last day alive, then my most precious belonging is my family, i would definitely like to spend my remaining time with them especially my husband & my mum…..they are the one i love the most amongst all. Elsa its quite hard to imagine, thanks for sharing a post on Scorpio Moon.
When I was gone on my trip Out West, my mother in law came to my house cleaned it from top to bottom, reorganised everything, took some a display of some of my little knick-knacks and put them in a box that say’s “Jen’s Treasure’s” to be put in the basement, re-painted my bathroom a different color, and just all in all made me feel dead inside. The problem is not that I don’t appreciate her kindness (because it does look a whole lot better, she is great at redecorating) and I know that she is just trying to make it nice for me and her son, she is a very gifted pisces why doesn’t she see that I am an extremely private person and I hate people always (this has happened my whole life) trying to find stuff out about me!! I am a scorpio rising, I have a ton of cap placements, leave me alone lady!! Come feed my cat like I asked you too and leave! Go redecorate your own house! ughhhh!! sorry to rant..