"I want to be a useful engine," said Mr. Ginley.
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It was a reference to the Thomas the Tank Engines books we used to read to our son. In the rail yard, it was Thomas' purpose in life to make himself useful.
"Why not shred that box of documents in the office?" I suggested. This served two purposes: disposing of old documents that had been slated for the shredder years ago and removing one more box to return the office to a usable workspace.
Of course, the shredder is not the industrial kind, so it overheats after a round or two of hard labor. Then you have to rest it for an hour or three.
During that downtime, Mr. started working on the area in and around the desk. He's had quite a time strolling down memory lane. There have been lots of random slips of paper with notes and quotes. Photographs. Office bibs and bobs (paper clips and such). Our son's school papers and baseball rosters. And hundreds of flash drives. (I do not exaggerate here.)
It's wonderful to be opening up the space, but it's also exhausting for Mr. Ginley. By the end of the day, he's physically knackered but also sagging under the weight of revisiting the past and wondering what the future holds.
And I'm left wondering how long it will be until we stop trailing little slivers of paper all over the house.
Photo attribution: Андрей Москаленко, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
