Laura offers tips on unloading the stuff that comes between you and a broken heart.
Broken relationships may leave us sad, lonely, or even relieved, but they also leave us with a pile of stuff acquired over that love-lifetime. Oh, the twaddle we collect in a romantic stupor. Maybe your lonely-heart loot has amped up value: pretty jewelry now tarnished by ugly memories, or the ultimate heartbreak flotsam: a wedding dress, tux, or the Ring?
Never Liked It Anyway offers post-relationship cleansing for your closets and your soul. It’s a website where “once-loved gifts from once-loved partners get a second chance”. The site was conceived when its owner, après wrenching break-up, realized she held a useless plane ticket for a now-cancelled getaway. With simple blogging software, she created a combination online group hug/swap meet. A brilliant website where newly singled users could vent their blues while offloading the detritus of disastrous unions, in an unintentionally green way.
Convert that impulse to torch the stuff into a sensible recycling exercise with environmental and financial upside. The loveless clear out memory-laden loot. The loot, picked up at bargain prices, is diverted from landfills. Sellers pocket some cash. Shoppers get added entertainment reading heart-wrenching/hilarious back stories. A wedding band selling at half it’s original price comes with the tale, “Prince Charming turned into a toad and gave me divorce warts. I’m not bitter, just BETTER.” A guy unloading an engagement ring says, “I’d like to get this ring onto the hand of someone who loves her partner more than her parents.” Ouch.
For saying Good Riddance to bulkier items, like your cedar Hope Chest or loveseat, check out second-hand furniture dealers. Nefertiti Furniture is an Emirati supplier of used furniture. Their website boasts that stock is “from European and American expatriates who only buy the best.“ I can vouch that a few of those discerning expats were motivated to sell by changes in marital status. Their eyes may’ve been red, but by locally reselling quality goods at fractional prices, their actions were quite green.
While you’re at it, divorce yourself from middle men (and women).
Why not dump things directly? Craigslist is a forum for posting classifieds, services and goods swapping with branches specific to Kuwait, Lebanon, Palestine and Israel. Post things you want taken away, for free or for a price. Freecycle is a nonprofit that’s all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of garbage bins. When I lived in recycling-crazed Ireland, rather than paying to dispose of 140 cardboard shipping boxes at the county waste center, I posted on Dublin Freecycle. Four different guys responded and in a matter of days, carted away all the cartons. This stuff works. There are Freecycle groups active in Cairo, Damascus, Tel Aviv, Haifa and Ankara.
Say it with (dead) flowers.
Not quite ready to move on? Itching to get in the last word? Take a peek at a novel niche in the billion dollar floral industry. Companies such as Dirty Rotten Flowers will deliver a custom arrangement to the object of your obsession; the kicker is the flowers are dead. Stems are sourced from traditional florists after their sell-by date, ensuring that your gift is green, even though the bouquet is decidedly brown.
Break the mashup between “heart” and “ache” by choosing positive actions in your move forward. Put a green-lining in your breakups.
Image via mbtrama
