shredding

I did some shredding today. And I'm talking ... an Enron-amount of shredding. Boxes and boxes of multi-colored confetti are now resting comfortably in the big ol' recycle dumpster at the local elementary school. But beyond the paper, there was much more.

A definite positive to this whole moving process is being forced to sort through all the crap in your life that's been sitting on the top shelf of the closet, or in the bottom of the junk drawer in the spare bedroom. You have to stop and analyze whether or not it's worth it to actually take something out of a box and store it somewhere ... again ... or just toss it.

Sometimes the digging isn't so deep and the decision isn't so difficult. I mean, how important is it to keep every single paystub you've ever received? Not very. And old bills, receipts and lease agreements from your first apartment out of college (almost 15 years ago ... GULP!)? Nah. Not necessary.

But then you encounter the stuff that makes you stop and pause before tossing it away. It doesn't necessarily mean you're pining for the past -- but more like thinking back to a time when life was simpler, and organized by fewer levels of complexity.

The yearbooks, of course you keep. And for some reason, I kept the [totally useless] box that my Aggie Ring came in. I threw away the random shot glasses, as well as the old tarnished James Avery dangle charm rings that were oh-so-important to me when I was a girl. There just comes a time when, as much as you love the memory, you have to finally part with the tangible evidence of it -- for the sake of sanity and space, in the very least.

Then there was the picture of Bev and I in New York City with those crazy guys we met -- the ones who we hung out with in countless bars that glorious, long weekend. The ones who painted their faces before the Texas A&M vs. FSU game and had us laughing for years afterwards. I'm never going to stick that photo in a frame, but seeing it today still made me laugh. So I saved it.

And then there were the cards, pictures, and other crazy nicknacks (a USAF name badge from his uniform?!) from the ex -- the BIG ex. Wading through all of this stuff didn't necessarily make me laugh. Instead, it made me exhale and think, "Dang. I was so close to making a very monumental mistake, wasn't I?" These tokens and trinkets had me pausing amidst all the clutter and crap, looking at my dusty, crazy life today and saying to myself, "Wow. I did it right." I threw away the uniform name badge. And it was cathartic.

The local Good Will made a killing this weekend. And I learned a lot about myself along the way.