Should It Stay or Should It Go?

Everything is electronic these days, and all our memories are being saved in a cloud.  

Photos, emails and all manner of greetings have been relegated to the stratosphere. Maybe that's why I have such a hard time letting go of old papers and letters.

I have at least three boxes to go through. They're chock full of greeting cards, many from people long gone from my life. Of course, I want to keep the ones from my parents and my son. But do I really need well wishes from coworkers who shared a slice of time with me decades ago? I think not.

And photographs? There are several plastic bins filled with pictures, mostly from my kid's early childhood. I'm sure those could be culled down, too.

Then there are the picture books. An oversized art book featuring Whistler. Doisneau photographs. Beatles snapshots. Noir glamor shots of movie stars. Eye candy that sticks to my fingers like flypaper whenever I consider setting them free. 

On the plus side, I don't buy nearly as many books as I once did. And most of the ones I have been buying are children's books. Whether it's a nostalgia thing or I just love the stories and illustrations, kids' books are the ones that have become my collectibles of choice. They're stuffed willy-nilly this way and that on a shelf. I take them out from time-to-time and read and smile a bit. It's all good.

Then there are the books I'm going to read "one day." Stacks and stacks of them. Some I bought when I lived in Lakewood, before I moved to Virginia. I've schlepped them to the Old Dominion and back, then to our current dwelling. 

In the meantime, like a deranged weasel, I continue to take books out of the library and read them rather than reducing the stack at home.  

I am going to read them, honest. 

Retirement is probably a mythical proposition for me, and by the time it happens, I may no longer have the wits to read. So why am I keeping them?

We'll call it hope.

There is a fear that one day they will come to get me and they'll have to make a path through all the detritus. Fortunately, newspapers are electronic. And they don't seem to print telephone books anymore. I guess that helps.

It's supposed to be a dull, rainy day, so maybe today would be a good time to start digging into the papers – even though I already know what's going to happen.

"Oh look, I remember..."

And so it goes. 

And I'm the only one who knows.