“I haven’t made soup all winter,” my mother told me the year she turned 85.
She loved making soup. But her big soup pot lived on the bottom shelf of a low cabinet, under a heavy roasting pan. Getting it out meant kneeling on the floor and lifting two heavy things, so she just stopped.
Nothing was wrong with her kitchen. It had worked fine for forty years.
It just worked for the woman she was at 60, not the woman she was at 85.
I think about that soup pot a lot now. I’m 64, and I plan to stay in this house for a long, long time. (My husband says he’s not going anywhere, either.)
So this fall, I started making a few changes. I’m not throwing out the things I love. I’m moving them, and letting go of the few things that would only get harder each year.
This is my plan for decluttering for aging in place, room by room and one small job at a time. It’s the house I want to live in at 85.
Why I’m Thinking About 85 Now
Most of us want to stay in our own homes as we get older. In a 2024 AARP survey, 75% of adults 50 and older said they want to stay in their homes.
I’m one of them. I want my own kitchen, my own chair by the window and my own coffee in the morning.
But a house only works if you can still reach, lift and open what’s in it. The time to