I will turn her room into a crafts room. Or create the fancy guest room I’ve always wanted. But not for her benefit. When grown-up life proves too hard and shees crawling back, she can stay in the basement or sleep on the couch.
My ruthlessness returns with a vengeance. Dresses, sweaters, leggings, and shoes she hasn’t worn since seventh grade are crammed into garbage bags.
Her thoughtlessness appalls me. Did I raise her to be like this? To treat what she owns—what I paid for—as so much trash? No, she left this mess to thumb her nose at me, as payback for treating her like the child she is.
“Fa la la, Mom, I am off to conquer the world, off to bigger and better things. Do be a dear and take care of this piffle. ”
I am a plague of locusts emptying the closet. Two piles grow to clumsy heights：one for Goodwill, the other trash.
There are more shoes, stuffed animals large and small, knick-knacks, felt pennants, posters, hair bands, and pink foam rollers. The job grows larger the longer I am at it. How can one girl collect so much in only twenty years?
It’s obvious she doesn’t care about me, her father, our home, or anything we’ve provided. We are the flotsam and jetsam, the detritus of childhood.
I stuff garbage bags until the plastic strains. I haul them down the stairs two bags at a time. Donations to Goodwill go into the trunk of my car; trash goes to the curb. Sweat and sore shoulders fuel my irritation4. My husband has left the house, perhaps to avoid the same fight I wish to avoid.
She left the bed rumpled, theforter on the floor, the sheets in a tangle. I strip off theforter, bla