Pack-Rat
I am a pack-rat. I hang onto the oddest things -- the top of a styrofoam cup, a defunct driver's license belonging to someone else, ticket stubs from every movie I've ever seen -- and sometimes I find them again at the most unexpected of moments.
I am in the midst of a huge late-winter/early-spring cleaning. Having realized that there is no way in my present economic state to ever leave my current apartment, I am on a mission to rid myself of the excess and turn my dwelling into a proper home -- one that might even be able to comfortably host the occasional visitor or two.
In the process, I am rearranging my whole organizational system and going through all sorts of odds and sods. This morning I came across a letter I wrote -- but never sent -- two summers ago when I was very, very angry. It was jarring to read and brought my state of busy-ness into a full halt. It's hard to describe all that reading the letter made me feel: sad at what was lost, I suppose, but mostly I felt strangely disconnected from the events. I'm not sure if that's a product of time and the natural healing process or of how events eventually unfolded.
I certainly felt grateful that my current life holds far less drama, but it also placed a shadow of doubt in my mind, as if I was being reminded that everything could fall apart at any moment, that life and happiness are fragile and temporal and that drama lurks and waits, ready to pounce on us -- on me -- at any moment.
That thought makes me tired. So tired, in fact, that I simply can really take the time to do more than nod to it and move on, as if it wasn't really there. No, I don't know what two more years in the future hold for me, just as I had no idea (despite some of my (incorrect) predictions) when I wrote that letter what the future would bring. I'm sorry there has been pain and loss and trauma in my life. But it happens to everyone. Right now, for the most part things are okay and I am trying every day to make things better. At the very least, my life is currently stable and drama-free and that's nothing small.
So I've paused, reflected on this latest treasure I discovered, but now it's time to return to the task at hand. I put the unmailed letter in my box of special things and resume my cleaning.
I am in the midst of a huge late-winter/early-spring cleaning. Having realized that there is no way in my present economic state to ever leave my current apartment, I am on a mission to rid myself of the excess and turn my dwelling into a proper home -- one that might even be able to comfortably host the occasional visitor or two.
In the process, I am rearranging my whole organizational system and going through all sorts of odds and sods. This morning I came across a letter I wrote -- but never sent -- two summers ago when I was very, very angry. It was jarring to read and brought my state of busy-ness into a full halt. It's hard to describe all that reading the letter made me feel: sad at what was lost, I suppose, but mostly I felt strangely disconnected from the events. I'm not sure if that's a product of time and the natural healing process or of how events eventually unfolded.
I certainly felt grateful that my current life holds far less drama, but it also placed a shadow of doubt in my mind, as if I was being reminded that everything could fall apart at any moment, that life and happiness are fragile and temporal and that drama lurks and waits, ready to pounce on us -- on me -- at any moment.
That thought makes me tired. So tired, in fact, that I simply can really take the time to do more than nod to it and move on, as if it wasn't really there. No, I don't know what two more years in the future hold for me, just as I had no idea (despite some of my (incorrect) predictions) when I wrote that letter what the future would bring. I'm sorry there has been pain and loss and trauma in my life. But it happens to everyone. Right now, for the most part things are okay and I am trying every day to make things better. At the very least, my life is currently stable and drama-free and that's nothing small.
So I've paused, reflected on this latest treasure I discovered, but now it's time to return to the task at hand. I put the unmailed letter in my box of special things and resume my cleaning.