This is the list I wish I had tucked into my mother’s birthday card the year she turned 75.
She would have rolled her eyes at it. (She did not like being told what to do.)
But I think she would have kept it, too. She kept everything.
At 75, my mother was still driving to church, still making banana bread on Saturdays, and still climbing the basement stairs with a laundry basket. Nobody worried about her house. Least of all me.
Ten years later, my brother and I had thirty days to empty it.
So many of the hard things we faced that month could have been small, easy jobs at 75.
A shelf here. A box there. A few words written on the back of a photo.
At 75, she still had the energy, the memory, and the steady hands. By 85, those were harder to come by.
So if you’re around 75, or you love someone who is, here is the decluttering checklist for seniors I wish we’d had. It’s 15 small jobs, one at a time, sitting down when you can.