My father is certain that all of my blog posts go out to Facebook, but here's how my blog works: only seven of you actually read the blog: John, Jack, Ivie, Max, Dad, Joan, Steph, Barbara. Everyone else has to actually click to read, so that means no one else really reads it. It's set to private and it forwards to email and then anyone who's subscribed can read and I update it every day so that the grandparents and the family can read it. I really write it for John and Jack. I keep meaning to have it published, but I haven't done it yet. Originally, I set it up so that it would go to my grandparents in Canada so that they'd get it every day and then they'd know what was going on, and then Jack had such a good time that I started to write it every day just to entertain Jack. Back to the Post-it Notes.
I'd be surprised if you didn't know most of my best posts start in the shower... but they do. While I was in the shower today, I was thinking about what I store on Post-it notes, and other random pieces of paper. When I was growing up, my father was absolutely at odds and ends if he didn't have a pad and a piece of paper (and they always had a drug name from a drug company on them. He had entire cupboards of pads and pens dedicated to supplies of pens and pads). At my house, they are Post-it name brands, and they are cute. And I write down snip-its of what I want to remember, and then I store it "somewhere." Anything important, I have written somewhere. If it happened, I have it written it down. Then, I have copied it, and stored it. Then I have saved it again on a computer, and on a hard-drive, and then usually on an iPod because I will have killed that computer.
In fact, I've been thinking about the way I keep memories, and the way I keep bits and bobs of things. I never finish off anything completely. I almost never finish anything completely. I leave the last chocolate for later, so I can really enjoy that... and then it goes stale. Last piece of gum, stale. Last bit of perfume? Last bit of lip gloss? Seeing a pattern? A lot of the last something goes bad so that I can get around to it later, and then I never get back to it. I look around me, especially the really wonderful things, and have often thought "I wish I had known that was the Last Time I Was Going to Do That. I'd Have Really Enjoyed That." and I have decided to try to enjoy things more like the are the Last Time. In fact, that's my New Year's Resolution. I hope that's why you'll be enjoying more pictures on the blog this year.
As I was standing in the shower, I went through the steel trap I keep in my head. Lately, I've been noticing that the steel trap that's the filing cabinet in my head is Really, Really Rusty. It's got some annoying missing teeth, and some gaps, too. I'm getting more used to that, but I have the assurance that when I want to find a file in the cabinet, like what it was like to vacuum first carpet I ever bought in the first carpet I ever bought in the first house I ever bought for the first time, the memory is there with the smell and the sound of the hum of the vacuum and it's there on top of the feeling of standing in the enormous house on the enormous mountain and it's compounded with the years and years it takes to get here. The best part about the filing cabinet I keep in the post-it note in my head is that the post-it notes are really big, and they can be endlessly rearranged.
Anyway, that's my New Year's Resolution, to be less of a wet blanket (because I'm really good at setting up activities, and really bad at enjoying them) and trying harder to "Seize the Day" and enjoy them. I'm much better at throttling the days... Working on it.
No comments:
Post a Comment