Thursday, March 4, 2010

A trip down memory lane.

"Memory is a way of holding on to the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose."       ~ Kevin Arnold, The Wonder Years
It's amazing how much the sunshine can boost my motivation. Today I tackled a project I've been meaning to get to for ages, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

I wish I could tell you it was something crafty that adds charm to the house or that is actually worth something, but realistically I am probably the only one who will notice or care. Which is fine with me because I'm the one who spends the most time in this house anyway.

This particular project involved hauling at least three boxes out of two different closets, completely emptying said boxes, and filtering through more than two decades worth of crap mementos and deciding which items to keep. The objective was to pare things down as much as possible to free up some very valuable storage space.

My criteria were pretty simple: When was the last time I looked at this? Does it still bring me joy? If my house burned down tomorrow would I miss this? If I were moving to an 800-sq-ft apartment across the country would I pay someone to pack this thing so I could take it with me? Will my kids care about this?

Among the items I kept are my baby book, a stack of poems and stories I wrote as a kid, my high school letters (softball, drama and band), an old fairy tale book (too delicate to put in the bookcase), the guest book and a few cards from our wedding, and a few random items from my college years. That's one small box. The other small box of keepers is full of newspaper clippings and wonderful cards and letters from my days as a news reporter.

It was a fun little trip down memory lane. I wished Steve had been here to reminisce over a few things from our wedding and honeymoon before they went in the trash bin. Who really needs a visitors' guide for Drummond Island from 1998 anyway? I did save the scorecards from the rounds of golf we played that week, though.

I let him win, by the way.

1 comment:

  1. Always fun going through things you haven't looked at in a long time. I did that too recently when I cleaned out my closet and opened up my box of letters Dave and I saved from when he was in the Navy. Brought tears to my eyes :) Good stuff

    ReplyDelete