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I spent the entire night eliminating boxes and stacks of papers.
I tossed years of unread magazines (although I can't bear to part with my old New Yorkers, The Writer, and Publishers Weekly children's issues).
And HIGHLIGHTS FOR CHILDREN. Years and years of HIGHLIGHTS. "Highlights, I can't quit ya!"
I have four walls again.
A carpet I can walk on without slipping on paper peels.
And a huge black trash bag filled with parts of me I had to let go. Love letters, penned by non-spouses. (Where did That girl go? Sigh.) Notebooks from NYU, filled with Jane Austen Honors English seminar meanderings. Political Science classes where my notes rang strangely familar tunes to the current state of our affairs. (Everything old is new again. But this new is beyond measure and shocks the conscience.)
And scribbles, my scribbles, my Notes To Self when I should have been listening to well-heeled professors. Somehow those notes were the hardest of all to let go. I wrote the best poems back then.. in the margins of my lined paper. I attempted to immortalize classmates in foppish cartoon drawings on the back of Very Important Class Notes. What was I thinking about back then? Old notebooks say so much.
But now they're gone. Listen to your junkman. He wants your old soul.
January 22 2006, 21:59:49 UTC 6 years ago
the pain. I would have found it all much too hard.
January 23 2006, 10:57:16 UTC 6 years ago
And It's Just A Box of Rain...
Susan. You know me too well.Your response was a dagger to my idiotic, trash-tossing Anal Self.
The notebooks were still in the black plastic bag and NOT outside in the garbage pails. (Monday Morning is Trash Pickup for me.)
You saved me.
You Saved Me.
I ran back and ripped out the pages I would have missed most.
Anybody want to borrow my notes on Jane Austen and The Estate?
(I miss those Honors English days. NYU served me well.)
And so I proclaim that today is Susan Taylor Brown day! Line up for your hugs, Susan. I can't wait to read HUGGING. I am so happy for you. We have so much to catch up on. So many exciting things happening in your life, Ms. Brown. How do you do it all? {}
"Someone saved my life tonight, Sugarbear...."
What was I thinking? I've saved those notes for (mumble mumble burp) years. Why would I toss them now? NOW when I need my words to back me up. When I need my words to remind me of who I was and what I so wanted out of life. And still do.
I thank you.
(My husband does not!)
Pffffffffghttthhhtttt to Logical People. Hurrah for the Packrats.
-Packrat Ross