Garage Sale
by Molly-Ann Leikin

Last weekend, there was a sign on a blossoming Jacaranda tree around the corner on Harvard Street, that said "Garage Sale - everything free - come and get it!" Well, I said to myself, there's a concept. That guy is going to get his garage cleaned out, and won't have to pick up a pinky. And I was right. As the sun set, I drove by and saw the space in question had been picked clean, as if by vultures.

It's a good feeling to have all the junk and clutter removed from your life. I've had a few garage sales myself, always accompanied by my home made chocolate chip cookies, with walnuts, to keep the uncommitted on the premises. Unlike most people, when I decide to give something away, it's gone. I don't sneak back downstairs after "Letterman" and hide stuff under empty Dell boxes, to reclaim when eager customers who've arrived at 6 a.m. from Pico Rivera with stolen Chevy's, have gone. Leikin's law is once it's on the heap, it's history.

This keeps my garage clean and the envy of the neighborhood. It feels good being best at something in this very competitive zip code.

Lately, I've been expanding the Concept of Cleaning Out beyond the garage - to me personally. Like many of you, I've been hoarding dumpsters full of unnecessary, tainted dung in my head and my heart that are of no practical, and certainly no positive use whatsoever. All they do is take up ugly space, preventing new, happy thoughts, ideas, projects and adventures from presenting themselves.

So I've been doing some mental housecleaning. I was told by a very spiritual person that the way to do this is to light a white candle, confront the anger-provoking incident, forgive the person - (no matter how horrendous or heinous his/her actions might have been - and no matter if he/she got away with it - you have to really feel the forgiveness) and then let it go, like a bouquet of pink, helium balloons, bound for the best part of heaven.

I started going through my forgiveness list one Friday night and was still at it well after "Sixty Minutes" that Sunday. There was a lot of weeping and wailing and altogether too many peanut M & M's, but man, by the time I woke up Monday morning, I felt completely cleansed of all the old, negative, destructive business that had been clogging up my life. My family, old boyfriends, Greengluck across the street, charming, tall, poets from Abaco Island, Bahamas, and every barking dog west of the Mississippi. I forgave them all. One by one. It was hard. The hardest thing I've ever done. But I did it. And I felt lighter. Slimmer. Prettier. I even think my teeth were whiter. My breathing was freer, deeper, I walked double my morning mileage and could've tripled that had I not had a client waiting. It was like letting myself out of jail after being incarcerated for thirty years for something other people did!

Any time the old, contaminated stuff tries to sneak back in, and believe me, it does, I have to tell it "na na na na na na, Jack - you're over - I dealt with you already - you're history. This is the present, there's no room or time for you here. I'm saving this space in my heart and my head for someone or something nice to come in and surprise me."

It's hard work guarding the gate, making sure the old junk doesn't arrive and try to fill the now-empty space with the force of the Michigan Militia, barricading the doors and reclaiming me as a hostage. But it's worth fighting for. Unlike the Jacaranda guy on Harvard, whose garage was cleaned out by other people, in this case, you and only you have the broom. As your old thoughts and rages return, keep confronting them, forgiving them and letting them go.

Rev. Pam McGregor told me that according to the New Testament, we have to do this seven times seventy. If you've ever been a staffwriter at A & M, it might increase to fourteen times one hundred and forty. Double that for Interworld. That goes triple for Marilyn Behemouth Taylor. But the process is the same: confront it, forgive it, let it go. And make sure it doesn't slink back in while you're watching final "Jeopardy".

With all your new, positive energy available, think of the great songs you can write, and all the productive time you can spend making sure your marketing process works!

In keeping with the spirit of my mental housecleaning, I decided to tidy up the shelves in my office, and started calling local charities, offering them several boxes of books. But some agencies only took furniture. Oh. Some wanted cars. Really? Late models preferred. Right. German okay? Many charities would only do a pick-up for a minimum of eight boxes. You want eight boxes? Fine. I took the four I had, emptied half of each onto the floor, roared over to Vicente Foods and watched Charlie unload Campbell's Hearty Soup cartons. Then I took four empty ones home, and now, as I'm writing this, I can hear the Salvation Army people gathering up their required eight boxes from my doorstep. I threw in some still-hot, home made chocolate chip cookies, with walnuts, just in case there was some kind of a paper work glitch and they were expecting a BMW.

© 1999 Songwriting Consultants, Ltd. All rights reserved.

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