Thinking Outside the Box

I’m evidently into boxes. I blogged earlier about using a box to organize my desk, throwing everything into the box at night so that when I walked in the next day, I would be met with a clean, clear desk. I’ve loved the idea and have integrated it wholly into my routine. A few weeks ago I realized that the box idea isn’t a new one to me----I’ve organized my life by a box method. Back in the 70's I started putting together memory boxes rather than the proverbial scrapbooks. I would cover a sturdy box and lid with decorative paper and put in everything I wanted to keep for that year----pictures, birthday cards, memorabilia. The next year, I’d start a new box.

About 20 years into that process, I had a lot of boxes, as you can imagine, so I began a consolidation. First it was into five-year increments, then a few years ago I condensed it to ten year spans. As I went through each box, I had an opportunity to remember some moments, look over some old theater tickets, try to recall why some of the miscellaneous stuff might have been important. I had a birthday card from someone named Joan----I no longer remember who she was. It was easy to let a lot of it go.

So now I’m questioning the whole idea. Does anyone care what I looked like in 1976? or who sent me birthday cards? Perhaps the better question is whether I care? On one hand it’s my data, my history; on the other hand it’s in the past. I don’t have children who will one day cherish a photo of me in my bell bottom jeans. I guess I’m aware that at some point in universal time, all this stuff will be recycled by someone, never to be seen again. Shouldn’t that be me taking care of this while I can? Of course there’s always the possibility someone will want to write an extensive autobiography about me after I’m dead and will want any and all photos and memorabilia they can find. Then again.....

I ask myself WWFSD? (What would Feng Shui do?) I know the mantra that less is more, simplify, simplify, yet I also know the underlying Taoist belief about flow. Perhaps there’s no set answer, but instead a compromise. Maybe there’s the ultimate memory box where eventually the memories of the most important parts of my life end up, but there are interim boxes leading up to that point. That way my stuff is always moving around, I’m regularly assessing where it should go, as I choose to move it to another box or relinquish it altogether. No stagnent ch’i here. Yes, indeed, I do like those boxes.