April 2020--It’s spring. We’re quarantined.
Makes perfect sense right about now what we could be doing with our time at home is cleaning it out. I don’t mean just dusting and moving something from one counter to another. I’m talking deep cleaning. Spring cleaning. I’m talking cleaning it out.
I’ve chosen to use several hours at night and more on the weekend to clean it out—not just up. Not much to really clean up since it’s just us two, and the pup. Ok…well, the pup is really what’s got me cleaning it up, but the pup has nothing to do with cleaning it out. We’ve been in this house for 33 years. He’s only been in it for a year.
So while I can blame him for the tattered paper strewn about the family room, the water droplets from his bowl all over the kitchen floor, the toys and bones all over the place, my shoes being in the the bathroom instead of where I left them, I can’t blame him for the 33 years of saving everything and I do mean everything. You know, just in case I need it. OR, just in case someone else needed it. OR, because it had sentimental value. OR, because I could use 13 of whatever it was. I saved everything. It’s pretty much confined to one room. And the boxes, drawers and shelves in this room are proof.
I have to say most of what I saved was because it had sentimental value. What I’m finding out now is that I’m pretty much the only one who has that sentimental attachment. And probably the only one who ever did.
I came across a replica of the front page of the South Bend Tribune from when the Chicago Bulls won the championship. Maybe I thought it would have some monetary value some day. Maybe I thought someone else would have wanted it. I have no idea. But I do have two of them if anyone is interested. In one of the drawers of a desk I was cleaning out, I found a Montgomery Ward key chain. Heck, I don’t even think anyone under 35 knows what or who Montgomery Ward is.
In that same desk, I came across a 3 ½” floppy disk with a label on it reading, “Orland Park On-Line!” That was from 1998—22 years ago. I was working at the village at the time and the mayor instituted this service to residents and businesses in town so they could “take advantage of the opportunity to access pertinent village information, village staff and officials 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.” It was a village-wide bulletin board system accessible to those with a computer and modem.
The accompanying flier also bragged about how people could send private email messages to village staff, officials and fellow OPOL users. Plus users could “talk” to others in “live typing sessions.” Live typing sessions? Who wrote that stuff? Oh wait—it was me. Today it’d be called a chat room. Think I’m going to turn it over to the Orland Park museum.
There are boxes stacked upon boxes stacked upon boxes in this room that 20 years ago became our home office. When I opened those boxes I found them mostly filled with photographs. I immediately sat down on the floor and went through photo after photo reliving all the wonderful memories. I bet I sat for more than an hour. What did I achieve? Nothing. Couldn’t throw away any of the photos. My time going through the photos let me have a lot of laughs. But none hardier than when I tried to stand up after sitting cross-legged on the carpet for more than an hour.
My travels through the desk drawers and shelves led me to uncover a Chi Tung finger bowl. I haven’t been to that restaurant in more than 15 years, a tortoise saltshaker given to me by a woman back in the early 2000s and a cowbell used at my daughter’s high school volleyball games. I’m not sure what to do with it. I’m sure she doesn’t want it. But it’s so hard for me to throw it away. On the bottom shelf were seven 3-ring binders. I can’t even tell you when the last time was I used a 3-ring binder.
There also is a tall plastic bottle—maybe a foot and a half—filled with popcorn and a sticker on it boasting the White Sox winning the World Series. Once you ate the salty snack, you could use it as a coin bank. I never opened it. Did I think some day that would be worth more than I paid for it? Anyone know the going rate for 15-year-old popcorn? Garbage? Recycle bin? Give it to my son who also is a White Sox fan? Can’t decide so it’s staying.
What I did find that really told me how much time has gone by were three keepsakes of my children from when they were young. There was the plastic band that was placed around my oldest son’s ankle in the hospital when he was born. And an envelope commemorating my second son’s first hair cut. I opened the envelope. The blond strands were still in there. And, the baby blanket given to us by the hospital when my daughter was born. It is white with pastel blue and pink stripes on it and is inked with the year and the hospital’s name. You remember those, right? These are items I just can’t throw away. And I won’t. Maybe Christmas presents to each of them?
At this point I needed to continue my work to declutter and clean it out or I knew I’d be taking another stroll down another memory lane. Focus, I told myself. Remember why you’re in here. It’s time to clean out this room.
I proceeded to go through more items—some went to the recycling bin, some were put in boxes to drop off at a local thrift store and some went straight to the garbage. And the things I didn’t know what to do with? They’re staying put until I do know.
Maybe they should call it fall cleaning. Then I think I’d having a fighting chance to get it done.
Take it one day at a time….
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