I am forever saving little pieces of paper that just seem to sit in my attic. I don’t need them. Why do I keep them?
Well, I have started this new project, dejunking as I call it. Somewhere I read that my house will ‘appear’ cleaner if I dejunk it so I now have found a new word that will appear through out my life until I feel I have met this new need.
As I am walking up my attic stairs, I really am not looking forward to doing this task. I feel like this is a different lifetime that I am entering. Pieces of my life scattered in boxes, piles through out my attic. (I even have saved cards through out the seasons and put them in the boxes when I pack up my holiday treasures.
I did start this project before this – I found when I opened the Easter box that I have three years of cards, drawings from my children and recipes stored with my decorations. I figured well, I haven’t made that Easter bunny cake yet, I don’t need that magazine article anymore. Pitched it. My kids are getting older (the twins are eight now) so I figure I will save on picture from each of them out of the twenty in the box to keep in their treasure box and I threw the rest away. Sure they were sentimental for a time, but we are in a new stage of life – we can color in the lines now, with new drawing coming home daily.
Yes, I know what you are thinking too, I do have ‘junk boxes’ to pass on to my kids when they reach that age of needing to know what their life consisted of. I started with these small little boxes that were to protect their baby books from the dust, the heat and the cold of being in the attic – but somewhere along the line, I had to move up to a big box for each of the children to contain their lives most important milestones that I could not to part with just yet. But this will have to be a task for them to tackle later, I am just the collector!
So, I have already been through the Christmas, Valentines Day, and St Patrick’s Day boxes, and now I am on the Easter box – all I really have left is Thanksgiving box that will be much easier so I think I will tackle that right now. --- Well, all that was in that box was drawings saved from the kids, and my decorations – so I am doing pretty good today even though the garbage is overflowing already and I will have to find another garbage bag.
I come to this pile of (well there had to be at least eleven or twelve) smashed beat up boxes that show that they are holding piles of old books and papers from when my husband was in school. Another education life contained into boxes. Useless boxes at that! While I have never actually gone through my husbands cardboard, I feel strange at doing this. Now mind you, he has been out of college for over ten years, and the boxes look like they haven’t been opened in that long either. The dust piling on top would be a great board for practicing the writing of my entire name!
Continued >> on the next page
