Is it like Christmas? No, it’s more like archaeology.
“It” is the act of cleaning out old file folders. The reason it’s not Yule-like is because of the nature of the things found, which are not remotely like gifts. Here, for example, is what I found in one folder.
The Adderley Quilt Rack-AM (ante meridiem?), for which this is a parts-and-hardware-supposed-to-be-in-the-box list, is long gone, who knows where, but the list lived on in my file folders. Why it didn’t go with the Adderley Quilt Rack-AM (adventure mode?) to its next mysterious stop is not itself a mystery: I forgot I had it. Out of sight . . .
Back in the day, I expect I didn’t file it for the parts side of the list. They, after all, were presumably all integrated into the Adderley Quilt Rack-AM (amplitude modulation?) once it was fully deployed. I expect the key, as it were, to its retention was that it was a handy spot for the single item of hardware on this list, the presumably right-sized item J–Allen Head Wrench (American English), aka Allen key (British English and in this house), generically a hex key–to be held in case of a future need for tightening or disassembly of said Adderley Quilt Rack-AM (account manager?).
Anyway, this surprise unearthing (unfoldering?) of an Allen key reminded me vaguely that I had a stash of Allen keys somewhere. It turns out I had two.
In the junk drawer
In the tool box
This can be characterized, I think, as an embarrassment of Allen keys. I can’t remember the last time that I used one for any purpose, which certainly makes it hard to justify having two stashes. It’s harder yet to figure out which one(s) to get rid of.
And that, my friends, is why my house looks a bit like a midden, and why it’s likely to stay that way. Seeing the excess requires only eyes; trimming it requires decisions.
Oh, MY! Oh, Yes! However, a mixed blessing in my house is that three sons, two of whom still are proximate, regarded tools of any kind as property more fitting in their stashes than in mine. I know exactly why I am going to need an Allen key (that dismantled day bed in the upstairs hall that will go back into the renewed corner bedroom, hopefully this fall). But where I will find the appropriate key is somewhat of a mystery. To counter the outflow of tools, I hid at a distance from the main location for tools, a small plastic tub with “essentials” for my own use. I will start my search for it there, then move to the drawers of five desks upstairs or down. Now that you mention it, it might be easier to go next door and beg one from a son!
Laurna – 🙂 I likely have a few Allen keys I could send you, but determining the size might be an issue. City dwellers might band together and set up a neighbourhood tool box. My need for any tool is rarely so urgent that I couldn’t spare the time to go next door, or even a block over, to pick one up.
I have reached the age of de-cluttering. I want to get rid of things. Like the shelf of Waverley novels with their poisonous green-arsenic bindings that my maternal grandfather bought (for show, I suspect, because they show no sign of ever having been read) that I know I will never read, and yet no one seems to want them, even on e-bay. So they stay. They don’t jump out and bark at visitors. They don’t bark in the night. They just stay. Perhaps my heirs will find a use for them.
Jim T – Good doggie. It’s a self-perpetuating problem that the easiest things to offload are the most recent. Once something is “vintage” it’s probably in your house for the duration, short of the will to chuck it. And I hate to throw things out. At least surplus Allen keys can be recycled – if not in my curbside recycling box then in a big bin at the closest Rona. Bless their hearts, they take all kinds of stuff.
… and some objects have gained a kind of emotional sentience. You pick it up and cannot throw it away. This is why I wrote, over the course of a year, a Pitch Journal. Before pitching thousands of items (some multiples like reams of used xerox paper), I wrote a little Obit, the object’s life story. I gained a few shelves but they are full again, didn’t take long. (Some were so bare it was disturbing.)
Barbara – Yes, and the longer stuff hangs around, the longer we keep it. How can I possibly throw out my grade school report cards? But last year’s performance assessment – meh. The stuff does seem to be winning, but think how bad it would be if we didn’t engage in battle.
Barbara, your Pitch Journal or Obit Journal is encouraging to me. While an entire houseful of “stuff” that my sister left went to the dump (my sons have no such quibbles about “family books” although they helped to shape my childhood), some of the things she considered most precious, including a collection of mostly broken knickknacks and a large tub of papers (letters and other records), I have kept. I have written one short story about her. I tell myself that I will need these memory-joggers to write others. I have considered mending a few of the pretty and cute objects and photographing others (for reference) that I would discard. Two years since her passing, I still am not sure how to separate the tangle of our shared humanity from a greater legacy that is my responsibility to pass on.
From Barbara – Pitching is as personal as grieving.
Isabel
Regarding tools, it’s always a good idea to have two of each, and keep them in separate places. That way there’s a greater chance of remembering where one is…or at least finding one when you need it.
It’s similar to the law of “measure twice, cut once.”
Tom
Tom – OK, thanks for the new-to-me Tool Principle: I see your point (more and more every year).
Isabel – on the subject of Allen keys and the need thereof. You obviously don’t have any Ikea furniture anywhere in your house.
John – I do have some IKEA furniture (there used to be more), but we haven’t had any reason to disassemble anything for a looong time. And I can’t possibly need the full array of options that I have. But what a nuisance to figure out which ones I *do* need!
Life in retirement is just one thing after another!!
John – Hahaha. Too true.