Not a Pack Rat!!!

I easily throw things out. Its an incredible talent I have. I throw things away as soon as I have no use for them. I don't have closets filled with clothes, even though I buy new clothes a lot. I don't have boxes of things, even though I have had a lot of things. I do not hold on to things I do not use. But deep inside of my closet (the big one in our office), way in the back is my hope chest. It holds the useless things, you just can't throw away. Deep inside my closet buried inside a cedar chest, are my useless treasures. I dug it out yesterday, I was looking for a picture I thought may be in it. I did not however find the picture, instead I took a foggy trip down memory lane. A dress wore only once, never to wear again, but never to throw away. My diploma, that reminds me of the hard work it took, just to walk to get it. My memories, here, mostly accounted for. They go further back into my past. Copies of the High school Imagineer (may have wrote that wrong) A poem I wrote inside. Cards, a few letters, and pictures of my high school friends. A scrappy underground newspaper, only ever published one time, and thought of mostly as a joke, but I clearly remember the April Fools Day, my best friend and I snuck them onto every locker in school. Ticket stubs, movie stubs! Notes that were put in my car, along with freshly picked yellow roses, from the sweetest boyfriend I ever had, (wow I was smart to not let that one get away). Newspaper clippings, First Place lip sync winners!, first place in the science fair, who is this girl and what happened to her?

Depeche Mode book, still in it's clear cover, a gift from an awesome brother. Letters from grandparents. Cards for my birthday. Stories I wrote as a child. Report cards. A small faded picture of a tiny casket, the only memory I'll ever have, of a brother I never got to meet. Letters to self, a school assignment. 10 things I like about me, wow I've come a long way in the self esteem area. My treasures, one mans junk, are the things that take me to places I only think about deep in my dreams. But just one look, and I'm right back in that moment that thought, that place.