What am I going to do with this?
Life is really all about accumulating junk. You know, the kind of stuff was either useful or cool back in the 80s, so you put it away so you’d be able to enjoy it for the rest of your life. Then twenty years later you realize that you still own that item and you don’t know why.
After moving six times in the first five years of our marriage, I thought The Wife and I had managed to eliminate a lot of that junk. Every time I repacked all of our possessions into yet another U-Haul truck, there was always some stuff that didn’t make the cut. Despite all that culling, it appears that some of my old junk just refuses to be left behind.
Case in point – this panoramic picture of my high school graduating class. I enjoyed high school. I look back on those days fondly. I even remember when we took this photo. Despite those warm fuzzies, I have absolutely no use for a laminated picture of my fellow classmates.
It’s not like I’m going to hang it up in my office at work or in the living room. I suppose I could put it up in my office at home, but quite honestly, it’s not worth the time/effort/expense to frame it, so it just sits in my closet now. How sad.
And it’s not the only thing I’ve got collecting dust. My high school letter jacket, youth sports trophies, various knick-knacks from trips all over the place… these things were all great when I got them, but now I’m basically just hanging on to them in hope that someday they’ll be needed for a museum display. That’s really about all they’re good for at this point.
Don’t even get me started on the fact that I’m collecting my kids’ crap too. We bought a three-drawer Tupperware cabinet to store priceless examples of The Boy’s schoolwork and it’s not going to be up to the task. He’s only halfway through kindergarten and the darn thing is already bursting at the seams. Oh well, he’s more likely to have his own museum someday, so I guess we should hang on to his stuff whenever possible.
Something that doesn’t give me any hope – my grandparents have the same thing going on. They’ve got a panoramic picture of some group (I’m not exactly who or when, it’s not labeled) and it’s been hanging on the same nail in their garage for at least the past thirty years. So at least it’s not just me.
Fries at the bottom of the bag
- I’m miffed that the president’s 15-minute primetime self-congratulatory swan song screwed up my late night viewing schedule. None of my cable shows were affected, but CBS pushed back Letterman and Ferguson by a quarter-hour. This kind of stuff completely derails me.
- No matter how many internal memos your company’s marketing department pushes out, the guy they pick to give the interview for an article never gets the product name right.
- I’m going to shift when I publish posts from late night to early morning. I figured it doesn’t make much sense for people to be reading my Wordless Wednesday posts on Thursday morning, unless a lot of my readers live somewhere out in the Pacific (and my traffic reports don’t seem to support that). So now Wednesday will actually be Wednesday and most of the other days should line up too. That’s the plan at least.
Too bad you didn’t “win” the mat and frame that everyone signed at the reunion, you could totally hang that picture over your mantel. I personally have reduced my high school memories to a file box. I kept things I thought my kids might like to see. And in the interest of full disclosure, I finally allowed my mums and corsages of dead flowers from all those high school dances to be thrown away just a month or two ago.
As far as Landon’s school work is concerned, I’ve decided to keep a select few things, but mostly, I’ll take a picture of everything and then he’ll have the pictures of his artwork when he’s older so he can store them, but at least it’ll just be on a CD or something.
(Oh and I rolled that class photo up with all my panoramic band pictures, so I have like 5 pictures in one tube, less space.)
I think we have matching sets of panoramic pictures. My poor parents having to shell out good money for so many things that they knew I’d end up later thinking, what am I going to do with this?
I try to go through an organize and get rid of stuff. I do have to admit, not having gone to school with Kevin, seeing his high school (and earlier) photos, is just hilarious!
I had panoramic band pictures at one point, but I haven’t seen them in years. They’re probably stashed away with my second cache of junk at my parents’ house.
I think my panoramic class photo is at my parent’s house. It was great when I was in school and I could keep all my ‘junk’ at their house. However, one of the first things my mom told me when Joe and I moved into our new house is “When are you going to come and get all your stuff? It’s time for it to go to your house now!!” I tried to find myself in the class photo, but it was a little small. I’m not even sure I remember where I was.
Oh, I remember where I was when that photo was taken. Directly behind the principal’s head, making fun of his toupee. Heh.
Just wait, you will accumulate so much of your kid’s junk, uh, priceless art and school work, you will have to rent a space to keep it all. I still have all of my kids art work from preschool and it can almost be considered an antique now! My kids still have not come to get all of their stuff from their rooms.
Ferguson?? Bloody hell, I love him. I admit to being slightly heartbroken when I heard her had gotten married. I went to a taping while I was in LA. He’s a cheeky little donkey!
Start putting it on ebay and see what sells. I got rid of some media guides that way. Including a media guide for the Aggie Band. You never know – someone from your high school may be looking to complete their collection. or not.