THE JUNK:
- 1. Broken binder
- 2. Broken Otterbox
- 3. Spatula
- 4., 5. Ice packs for shipping my Enbrel
- 6. Box of papers
- 7. Box for heating pack
- 8., 9. Two jars of paint
- 10., 11., 12., 13. 14. Five paint rags
- 15. Paint stirrer
- 16. Used painty-thingie for a painting edger
- 17. Vanilla coffee syrup
- 18. Chicken wire
- 19., 20., 21. Tea that expired in 2011 or earlier, two boxes of it that I had never opened.
If I had a loose plan for finishing one room a month, I’m woefully behind schedule. Good thing I’m not getting graded on it.
I realized a couple of things this week: 1) Sometimes things just aren’t worth messing with and 2) I have bought a lot of stuff that I never, ever use.
The Otterbox has a lifetime warranty, yes. But after having replaced a couple of parts on it multiple times (and dealing with their shitty customer service), I just decided to trash it and buy a new non-Otterbox one. It costs something like $2.50 each time you file a warranty claim. For the number of times I dealt with them, I could have paid for the excellently-rated cheapie that I partnered with shatterglass at least once–and probably a couple of times over.
There comes a point where it’s just not worth throwing money in the same direction.
As I’ve begun keeping a closer eye on my spending (aside, why is it that every time I start tracking my spending a bazillion “unexpected” expenses come up?), I’ve managed to shave a minimal amount of spending down, with the goal of cutting my spending 10% by the end of the year. Maybe because these two things are intersecting, but I’ve noticed that there’s a hell of a lot of low-dollar stuff I’ve bought that I just didn’t need. Or want. Or thought I wanted but got distracted by a shiny object.
I’ve been at the purging for over five months now. Without counting the weeks that I did more than 21 things, that makes it four hundred and forty one things that I’ve counted, and that’s not including the things I’ve thrown out but was too lazy to count because I was in a frenzied cleaning mode. (It’s about as rare as a solstice blue moon, but it does happen.)
Sometimes I amaze myself.
THE LAGNIAPPE:
A most awesome thing happened this week. In clearing out the garage, one box at a time, I discovered that I haven’t lost all my writing from before Katrina after all.
Mud-covered, faded, and stained, I have bits of poems, bits of dreams, bits of stories. Letters from people I didn’t even remember writing me. A whole lot of bits that I didn’t even remember writing. I spent a bit of time ooh-ing and aah-ing over them, tickled that I’d found them.
Lots and lots of words. Words I’d written. Words others had written to me. Words and words and words.
It’s over ten year old writing, from a place I was before college, before the second great love of my life, before my dog, before my niece and nephew were even thought about. Before I had a home for myself. Before R.A.
All of it is now in a file folder to be transcribed when I have the opportunity. Filed away for closer inspection. I daresay I’m in for a bit of nostalgia. It’s kind of exciting, a world I’ll be revisiting.
I came across this, though, before I really studied the meaning and use of words. And here, nearly eleven years later, it still rings as true for me as it did over a decade ago:
Words
Words will be the death of me,
And in truth, I am reborn.
Words, the perfect Universe,
Perfect Circle,
Imperfect Perfection,
Perfect.
Within words, we are born,
Hatching ideas from the Egg of all Wisdom—
We create, and are created—
We expand, and are born.
Words, the jailers of our soul,
Measuring the infinite with finite descriptions:
How does one describe the essence
of God?
of a laugh?
of an orgasm?
Within words, we are slain,
Leeching our power and losing it freely—
We belittle and are belittled,
We wither and are slain.
We choose destruction when we could save;
Choose to begin when we should end.
Gather Hope, in words, for the Spiral dances,
Another opportunity, again and again,
Until it ends.
Only to begin anew.
Raise arms, in words, to destroy the truest monster
That eats away our very soul—
Apathy.
For therein lies true death, from which there is no salvation.
“Fear is not the end of this,”
“Death is only the beginning.”
Truth lies just beyond the doorway,
Embraced, sheletered, and protected
By words.
Will you dare? Do you care?
Are you even truly alive?
© 2005 N. J. Ray
Lyrical Fool 