Wait December, don't go!

Only 3 more days left in the year! Eeps. There is always this really destructive or perhaps cleansing part of me that wants to throw out stuff that is no longer of use to me. It's like a premature Spring Cleaning mode that puts me in good graces with the universe. I hate accumulating useless stuff. This past December end, I made an effort to clean out all of my useless make up supplies. I also made an effort to read a lot of my journals from the past.

Coming back to my room in my parents house in PA is always such a switch in mindset. Because somehow, even though I've moved on to working life in DC, my room and its decor has remained stuck in time. It's the anachronistic snapshot of the things forgotten from my past and present. The inexplicable Anne of Green Gables that David Koppstein gave me for my birthday somewhere in middle-high school time period looks brand new. I didn't think I was an Anne of Green Gables kind of girl till I read some of it. Then the violin concertos remind me of how long its been since I touched a bow and strings. The secondhand F. Scott Fitzgerald collection of short stories, compliment of Jason Hwang sits there worn with time, not of my doing, but reminds me of how my friendship with Jason has grown and gotten better since college. Next to that are an eclectic mix of international travel guides from Italy, Europe and China. Then there's The Devil of Charleston, a horrible short story/novel that Peter's mom insisted on buying us after our Charleston ghost tour guided by the Author Rebel Sinclair. I think he and I both got through a chapter or two before admitting she shouldn't quit her day job. It's subtle, but there are so many little things in this room that reminds me of Peter. After we broke up, my mom took the liberty to remove all of his pictures and letters from my room. She thought she cleaned him out of my life. But I knew that the stuffed lion named Commodore was a gift from his aunt Martha when we went to The Biltmore with his yia-yia and aunt. The little flower journal that's next to my Les Miserables is full of pages devoted to the accurate yet not emotionally detached beginnings of a first love that ends in the prologue with So it begins...For Peter. And in my closet sits a shoebox coincidentally labeled "Achieve New Balance" where all of my memories are waiting to explode back into my mind. I remember putting a lot of things into that box, but the only thing I can remember now that sits in the box is another box. I couldn't say for sure what else could be in there. Perhaps pictures? or a necklace? No, I think the necklace was the first thing I gave up. Regardless, the dreadful box hasn't been opened since it was filled and closed the first time. Yet it remains, all of it subtly disguised in my room. Camouflaged to match and agree with the less emotional items such as this yellow smiley face blow up ball that I have no idea when came to reside in my room. The over 3 decades old calculator that my dad passed on to me when I started middle school barely flickers when I hit the on button. It's a battery run calculator. Trusty. I have beer pong balls sitting in a Joe college day flask. Appropriate. I also found these random Leukemia & Lymphoma Society stuffed bears-one dressed in a pink dress with a crown on its head, and the other blue and white with a Yamaka on its head and a blue heart that says shalom sitting in the middle of my desk in a pretty gift box. I was really confused for a split second and then came to the correct conclusion that my mom had donated money to the Leukemia Society and received these stuffed bears. I'm going to stick with the fact that she didn't get to pick them. I didn't have the heart to give them back to her so they just sit there now along with the other awkward and disjointed objects of my life.

Somehow I wish to give some order into this mess of a room. I wanted to clean out the things that no longer pertain to the now me. Get rid of the US History textbook titled "The National Experience" that I somehow came to acquire after 10th grade. Then there is this giant envelope of memories from China this summer that I haven't quite sorted through. And of course, my senior year calendar book that documents every noteworthy event of senior year. It belongs in a row of other calendar books that I've kept since 7th grade. Any one of my high school friends would remember that I'd document my life in an agenda book. I even wrote short vignettes and long journal entries in those agenda books. It was incredibly crucial that I shouldn't lose something so revealing. I guess in so many ways that's how our past remains a part of our present and influences the future.