We are moving our headquarters office next week in Boston. All week each of us has been taking some of our free time to pack up our belongings for transport to our new space. More importantly, it’s offered us a time to recycle and purge.
I love having the chance to rid myself of the past. I am the anti-pack rat. Unlike my children, who like to hang on to their shopping bags and receipts items they purchased three months ago, I will storm through my house on a fairly regular basis looking for reasons to get rid of things. In fact, I just scheduled my annual date with 800 GOT JUNK to come and haul away a bunch of crap. It is remarkable how much lighter I feel when they pull out of my driveway. I’ve never had a colonic, but if I had, I’d imagine this is what a home version of one feels like.
This office clean out has been rather bittersweet for me, however. Having been here for over three years, it’s remarkable how much stuff one accumulates. Not files per se. Most of those are now in electronic form and easy to manage without the abundance of paper like in the olden days. But I have drawers full of badges from attended events. I have birthdays saved that made me smile. Enough spare change to take half the sales floor to lunch. Interesting articles that were read; or not read. Most significantly though, were the family pictures that were tucked away a year and a half ago.
Of course the pictures of my daughters still remained on my windowsill. But the pictures of the four of us had been carefully tucked away. Upside down so I wouldn’t have to look at them when I open those drawers in search of a highlighter or binder clip. And now, being forced to empty out those drawers, I had to face emptying out those frames.
And I did. The frames are making the move to the new space, hopefully to be filled with new memories and experiences. The pictures from my past have been placed in an envelope on its way back home. A yellowing reminder of a lifetime ago.
Just when you think you’ve moved on, reality likes to keep you on your toes and slap you across the face. I swear I thought I found this note in my top filing cabinet drawer.
"Dear Christina,
You think you’ve this, girlie? Smarten up. You aren’t as tough as you think. I am here to keep you humble. So shed a f’ing tear now and again, and realize it’s okay to admit your “new life” is really, really hard to balance. And, please, for the love of god, remain true to who you are. Never compromise. That will lead to your undoing.
Love,
Reality”
PS - I’m proud of you. You have been doing a pretty good job so far. But get off your lazy a** and start exercising. You will feel better and no one wants to see a 46 year old chick in a bikini unless she looks like Demi Moore. So get to work.
Of course, it was an illusion. If it had been real, it might have been one of the only things from that drawer I would have kept. The rest got tossed.
I love a good fresh start.
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