Inheriting My Mother's Toothpaste

...and other weird consequences of death

We lost my mom in February 2024. In her 84 years of life, though, she had always been a type-A clean freak. She made Maria Kondo look like a hoarder. And throughout my adult years, she never missed an opportunity to get rid of stuff in her house that she deemed extraneous or, at the very least, no longer needed. If she got tired of the color of some object in her house, it ended up at my house. Did she donate anything to Goodwill? Only as a last resort. Her first choice was always to dump boxes of her leftover stuff in my car anytime I visited.

So, over the past twenty years when she and my dad lived near me here in Pittsburgh (instead of living 2,000 miles away in Las Vegas where they’d retired in 1994), I routinely came home with her cast-offs: everything from curtains (even though we’d bought a house that came with expensive custom window treatments), to bath towels (in colors that clashed horribly with our bathroom), to knickknacks she’d received as gifts from people whose names she no longer recalled (despite knowing I despised dusting the million tchotchkes I already owned), to small pieces of furniture and even couches (since she figured our Victorian house had more room than their cute little ranch house).

When she passed away, one thing I figured would end was the tendency to toss leftover stuff my way. Unfortunately, she had trained my dad well in their 63 years of marriage. Dad wanted to find good homes for her stuff, and her tendency to just willy-nilly get rid of everything had not left this world when she did. It started with innocent questions from Dad: Would I have any use for any of her jackets? How about her neon paisley leggings? Maybe her hundred pairs of slip-on sneakers? Hats? Scarves? Socks?

I was at least grateful Dad didn’t ask about her underwear.

So I’d take a token piece of clothing and tried to look grateful, despite the fact that Mom had literally lost 70 pounds in her final year of life and she could have worn one leg of my plus-sized jeans as a sleeping bag. The rest of her perfectly cared-for clothes went to the Salvation Army, neatly arranged and segmented out by type and packed in brand-new boxes Dad bought especially for the occasion.

I figured the hand-offs were then over, but I was wrong. Things continued to trickle my way as Dad continued to weed through her belongings. First it was her jewelry. I’m not big on wearing jewelry, so I chose a few pieces and let the rest go to my brother’s family.

Next were her sewing notions (despite the fact that I never sew) and their inkjet printer (which Dad would never use)—which is still sitting in the back of my car since we own four working printers already.

Then it was food in their pantry or fridge that he would never eat: her favorite Chunky soups, her bottle of ketchup, her ranch dressing. Up next were the many door decorations and other seasonal items that Dad would never put out, although we already own too much of that stuff and it sits in plastic totes on the third floor, untouched.

By this point I assumed we were done with Dad purging his house of all these items. He’d told me early on that he wanted to get everything neat and tidy so that my brother and I won’t have to worry about that stuff when he passes. So I guess I worry about it now instead.

I told him if he keeps up this pace, soon he’ll be living in an empty house with nothing more than a recliner, a computer on the floor, and the Comcast cable box at his feet.

Last month, though, he really hit the bottom of the barrel. He’d gone through the medicine cabinet. And that’s how I inherited my mother’s toothpaste.

Yes, she had two unopened tubes of Colgate toothpaste. Why wouldn’t Dad just use them? Because he prefers the gel. So, I was sent home that day with two tubes of white Colgate toothpaste, some antibacterial bandages, and a box of Biore deep-cleansing pore strips.

I think the only thing of my mom’s that’s still in their house is, well, my mom. In her urn. The one with her picture on the front. The one that sits on the end table next to Dad’s recliner and grins at him all day long. She’s not going anywhere, and that’s the way he prefers it.

And I’m okay with that.