Ralph is a retired English professor who has never married. He has lived in the same home for forty years, but has recently decided to move to Florida to be close to his sister.
However, his first meeting with his realtor did not go well. Much to Ralph’s surprise the realtor seemed astonished at the amount of items in his home and expressed concern that he was not ready to sell. Ralph has since taken a closer look at his home and thinks she over reacted. While he knows he is a bit of a “pack rat” he doesn’t see the problem. Yes, he cannot access his third bedroom properly as there are so many stacks of books and old journals in there, but this is his collection, and while he only uses half of his kitchen this is because he is not much of a cook, not because he is using the other half to store broken appliances with which he likes to tinker. After all, he only started storing them in that part of the kitchen because he wasn’t using it. And in all fairness, he has been in his home for forty years so of course all his drawers and surfaces are filled with stuff- surely this is the case in the homes of others? Ralph feels hurt and angry at the realtor’s words, but realizes he may have to part with some things to sell his home. However, this scares him as he has become quite attached to his things and feels overwhelmed at where to begin.