I Have a Box Full of Memories
I Have An Old Trunk...... I think my parents bought it for me before I left for USAF. It's gone with me everywhere I've gone. I got a larger one just like it and not as banged up but the smaller one has much more meaning because It's been with me longer. Some of its contents include (but are not limited to):
1. My old USAF medals
2. An old AA road atlas of the UK
3. An afghan my Grandmother knitted for me
4. An afghan my old girlfriend knitted for me
5. Old military caps
6. Old pictures
7. Old maps
8. Two old Joint Analysis Center (USEUCOM) sweatshirts
9. A keffiyeh and agal (scarf and belt) from Saudi Arabia
10. My first PDA I purchased in 2001 and folding attached keyboard
11. A piece of wood from Ecuador
12. A skybox ticket from a NY Giants game
13. A Gideon's New Testament
14. My old ACA* workbook
15. An old blousing strap
Many other scraps of memories of my live dwell among the aforementioned items.
Long-winded French author Marcel Proust once theorized that memories are locked up in inanimate ob<x>jects and are released when as they come into contact with their owner. That makes sense. Sometimes the memories are good ones. Sometimes they're bad ones. But if something ever happened to that trunk, I would have no evidence I lived the life I lived. While married I kept this trunk locked. My wife made it her mission to go behind my back and throw out as much of my stuff as possible. Out of a deeply repressed fear that she would throw away its contents, I kept it locked and maintained "positive control" of the key.
When the $#!+ hit the fan with my marriage on Feb 12, I put together my exit strategy. I got all my family heirlooms into that trunk. When the time was right I moved it out of the house and into storage. Getting it out was truly a relief.
I need that trunk to remind me of my past accomplishments and pleasures. That trunk is the story of my adult life. That trunk is my soul.
* ACA = Adult Children of Alcoholics. A 12-step program with origins in Al-Anon. ACA focuses more on living life as an adult having been raised up in an alcoholic or other dysfunctional childhood.
1. My old USAF medals
2. An old AA road atlas of the UK
3. An afghan my Grandmother knitted for me
4. An afghan my old girlfriend knitted for me
5. Old military caps
6. Old pictures
7. Old maps
8. Two old Joint Analysis Center (USEUCOM) sweatshirts
9. A keffiyeh and agal (scarf and belt) from Saudi Arabia
10. My first PDA I purchased in 2001 and folding attached keyboard
11. A piece of wood from Ecuador
12. A skybox ticket from a NY Giants game
13. A Gideon's New Testament
14. My old ACA* workbook
15. An old blousing strap
Many other scraps of memories of my live dwell among the aforementioned items.
Long-winded French author Marcel Proust once theorized that memories are locked up in inanimate ob<x>jects and are released when as they come into contact with their owner. That makes sense. Sometimes the memories are good ones. Sometimes they're bad ones. But if something ever happened to that trunk, I would have no evidence I lived the life I lived. While married I kept this trunk locked. My wife made it her mission to go behind my back and throw out as much of my stuff as possible. Out of a deeply repressed fear that she would throw away its contents, I kept it locked and maintained "positive control" of the key.
When the $#!+ hit the fan with my marriage on Feb 12, I put together my exit strategy. I got all my family heirlooms into that trunk. When the time was right I moved it out of the house and into storage. Getting it out was truly a relief.
I need that trunk to remind me of my past accomplishments and pleasures. That trunk is the story of my adult life. That trunk is my soul.
* ACA = Adult Children of Alcoholics. A 12-step program with origins in Al-Anon. ACA focuses more on living life as an adult having been raised up in an alcoholic or other dysfunctional childhood.
51-55, M