This is Why I Hate Progress Posts

I am approximately 26 weeks into this process. I've been meaning to do  "progress post" for weeks, but recently I've had to pull things out of their hiding places to sort/ clean them, so it looks just as cluttered as ever.

Today I promised myself I would post one. Progress posts, like the rest of this blog, are a means by which to hold myself accountable. I can't say they carry the "wow" factor I had hoped for originally, but I do notice all the things in previous pictures that are now long gone. 

This week, I also noticed all the things I already claimed to get rid of that are still kicking around my room. Uhg. I also did not bother to take bags and boxes of trash and donateable items out this time.  Oh well, maybe next month...

Sept. 30th

Oct. 30th

Jan. 22nd

March 13th

Now onto some before and after shots from the rest of the room.

Sept. 2nd

March 11th

Sept 2nd

March 11th

Sept. 2nd

March 11th

Sept. 2nd

March 11th

Sept. 2nd

March 11th

Sept 2nd

March 11th

Mulling Over Memory Books

My goal for the last hour was to straighten things up enough for a decent "progress" shot of the room. Had I been thinking, I would not have started by packing up all my old photo albums, school yearbooks and camp memory books. I basically just spent the past hour flipping through pages.

Of the thousands of photographs I could write about, this is one of my favorites. Here is a picture of my fiance from 1996. He is the one in the bottom right hand corner with all that hair.

It is not that I think the picture itself is stunning. I just get a kick out of the idea that I probably saw this hundreds of times while looking through my memory books seven years before we actually met.

If These Walls Could Talk

It is time to tackle the walls. Once again, plenty of memorabilia from high school and camp. I sometimes find myself wondering if that means that these were my glory days, or simply when my hoarding got serious.

First, this series of postcards that were lined up by the window.

I got these on the trip I took Europe in 10th grade. They were being given away for free in a skeezy basement bar in Munich. Now, I am not openly admitting that I had my first drinking experience on a school sponsored field trip (especially considering I now earn my paycheck hanging out with kids who violate school policy), but we did have time to "explore the cities" on our own in a country where the drinking age was 16. Coincidentally, this was the same trip where I missed a whole day of site seeing because a mysterious 24 hour bug left me puking all day.

Next, posters from my closet:
(presumably moved after I had grown out of them, but, shockingly, was not ready to throw them out)

 Mom did not care for the tag line of this poster, "Sex. Clothes. Popularity. Is There a Problem Here?". She most likely made her trademark groan of disapproval. As an adult myself, I can't say I would be thrilled if my 13 year old hung this in her room either.

 I never cared for this poster, I just couldn't ever get rid of it because it was a gift from someone else.

Posters from almost every play I was in during high school.

Ribbons from my one year on ConVal's Track and Field Team:

 I threw discus and shot put. Pretty sure that the "heats" I competed in never had more than 5 or 6 people. (Quote marks used because I legitimately have no idea if it is called a heat if you are not actually running)

Random ads, photos, and decor I thought were cool at the time:

Okay, the Dawson's Creek ad- not so random. I LOOOOOOVED the Dawson throughout high school and college. The frenemies, the love triangles, the worries that because you didn't make something of your  life by 17 you were a total failure- oh, it was like watching my life on the small screen- or at least that's what I wanted to believe. All that, and, I was constantly fascinated by how much James Van Der Beek looked like my older brother. I'm pretty sure my brother founds this comparison obnoxious and inaccurate. No one else really seemed to see it either. He was away at college at the when this show started, so I didn't have as much face time with him. This look-a-like thing was probably just all in my head.

Then there's this gem, for which there are no words:

Sadly, the shine from the flash makes it hard to fully appreciate the unicorns on the other side of that rainbow.

Lastly, there is a whole collection of Gotchs and other small tokens from my LC/ LIT years at camp. For those of you who do not know, these are the two years in our leadership training program. Leader Corps happens the summer after 10th grade. Your LIT (Leader In Training) year is the year you transition from camper to staff. It is similar to your year of graduation- a reference point in time that give other alumni a sense of whether or not you would know the same people. Coincidentally, this is the program I now run. It is like being the senior class advisor ever year. Best. Job. Ever.

 

"Amanda, is that human hair?"
No my friends, that is part of a weave that fell out of my friend Mariah's hair. If I had logical reasons for saving everything I'd saved over the years, this blog would not be as interesting.

 This head band was made for me after I completed Black Tag, one of our more secretive traditions. I'd tell you all about it, but then I'd have to kill you.

An I.D. bracelet my co-leader made for me. She made them for everyone on staff with their nicknames. I did not have a nickname.

My most valuable lesson of the night? If you leave scotch tape up for over a decade, there is no way you can avoid pulling huge chips of paint off with it.

On Empty Milk Crates and Happy Thoughts

Spent some time cleaning/ organizing today. Here's the end result:

That's a bag of papers to be burned and 3 empty milk crates. "Why do we care about empty milk crates?"  you ask (I feel a better question would be, "Why I am I spending my weekend reading a blog about someone else cleaning their room?" but you're already here, so I'll humor you); because those crates used to be packed with teacher books, files folders filled with lesson plans, and binders on a variety of topics- all now decluttered and neatly organized and tucked away- just waiting for my next move. And, because each was filled past the top and therefore unstackable, there's now approximately 3 more square feet of floor/ horizontal surface space in my room.

The files all went into one of my two filing cabinets, the one from the fleeting days of my independent living, not the one I'd asked for and received for my 13th birthday (are you really surprised?). One look at the cabinets original contents and it was clear that this is where I put stuff that was "to be filed" instead of actually just filing it. It was draw full of random papers- mostly bills and various statements- all stacked or just jammed in without rhyme or reason. Among them, pay stubs from earlier jobs, specifically, jobs where I didn't THINK I was making that much money, but now, of course, I make even less. But, we know what happens when we dwell on these things, so, I chose to focus on some happier scraps of paper.

Clockwise, from the upper left:

• Papers from some of my favorite students at the ALL School
• A playbill for Xanadu
• A name tag from my brother's wedding
• An invitation to my friend Loren's wedding
• A postcard from Nick when he visited Japan
• A valentine from Nick that reads, "iguana love you forever" on the inside
• A graduation program from when my "little" Iva, from Big Brothers/ Big Sisters finished high school
• A short letter from my friend Renee

I also happened across this flower in all my organizing:

My high school boyfriend Mike (introduced here and more recently referenced here) was/ is something of an origami guru. While I kept most of the things he made me, shockingly I did not have one specific spot where I collected them all. They are, therefore, spread all around my room. I come across his one of his pieces every few weeks. It's like a delightful, unplanned Easter Egg hunt.

10 Year Jacket Memorabilia

 

When you spend 10 years at Camp Takodah, you get a jacket, a ceremony honoring you time there, and a boat load of hand crafted and gifts and cards. I got mine in 2003. Picture above is just part of my collection. The tissue paper/ pony bead/ balloon hat was sadly lost years ago without photographic archiving. What remained was (clockwise):

•  a duct tape wallet with the CT logo on it
•  a photo with my co-leader that year, Mary Taylor, which she hand painted
• a plastic necklace
• a book about friendship- which, in hindsight, may have been a birthday gift
• a light saber made out of fimo
• a pet rock
• more light sabers- these one made from pipe cleaners.

Not pictured are a handful of other gifts that were either already thrown out years ago or that I could let go of. Included in that latter group was a Top Ten list of memories my friend Steph wrote for me on, you guessed it, a light saber.

The girls in my cabin also wrote an performed this song for me, set to the tune of "I Think  We're Alone Now".

This was a great group of girls to work with.  They are now super impressive adults with hip office jobs, inner city teaching positions, and one is even roaming Africa with the Peace Corps. When I met them, they were fresh out of 9th grade. I continued to work with them as they went through our leadership training program. It is part of the reason I eventually landed the Leadership Development Director position, arguably the best job on our staff. Yup, I pretty much just found an awesome group of kids and rode their coat tails to the top.

Close-up on the necklace. The letters are worn away, but it used to say, "Hey Friend", which was my catch phrase for this and a few other summers. While I would never admit it at the time, there were a few years when I was trying to be a trend setter. "Hey friend" caught on much better than the year I insisted on wearing my hair in braids with a bandanna around my head. Apparently, only Willy Nelson can pull that off.