Tales of the Storage Unit

My storage unit is almost cleared out. I've gotten rid of so many things that I never wanted to get rid of, and kept so many wild card items. A pillow I couldn't part with. Braveheart Lion, who as a little girl, I believed would make me brave and cure my fear of the dark. He didn't. The little stuffed dog that a customer bought me my first day on my first job, a random act of kindness that still touches my heart.

But what has surprised me the most is the therapeutic action of clearing out memories. Of saying goodbye to those who hurt me in the past. Finding a printed out instant message conversation between myself and an ex, and coming to the simultaneous realization that he treated me like dirt, and that he did care about me. I read it, then ripped it into little pieces, throwing it, and his hold over me, away. I found cards from friends who've since left my life, and whispered thank you for the memories, as I threw the painful reminders away. I found letters from men who hurt me so long ago, and I rip them up, hoping to be free of the burdens of the past. I find pictures of myself looking so happy alongside those who would later betray me. I pray they never hurt another the way I was hurt, and, you guessed it, those pictures get torn in two. Me on one side, scum on the other.

But perhaps more amazing (and certainly happier), were all the good memories that I found mixed in with the bad. Pictures from school dances, old plays, field trips; all with people that in another lifetime I called friends. When I look back on my younger years, I always feel that I was alone, but I really wasn't. My close friends may have been people I found as an adult, but I had my niche growing up. I had people I sat with at recess. Boys and girls I took pictures with at the dances. There's a great picture of Sadie Hawkins, either Sophomore or Junior year. When I find a scanner, that's going on facebook. I'll give you a preview: blonde Maile with pigtails and red cowboy boots.

I found pieces of paper that embarrassed me. Made me cringe for the awkward preteen I once was. I found a diary from when I was about ten, with entries dedicated to a boy I'd since forgotten all about. I wasn't always a writer; that diary was obviously the work of a young child. I found my diary from my first week of college. An insecure book wondering why these people even liked me, and marveling over the fact that I had no idea which friendships would stick. One of the girls mentioned in that book is still a friend, albeit through facebook and the occasional email.

And now at thirty, on the brink of a new life, I say goodbye to these memories. To the painful, to the joyous, and to the humiliating. I remember that we've all been hurt by those we trust, that we've all been burned. I tell myself not to shortchange friendships from the past, even if they're not as close as they once were. Even if they've faded away completely. I laugh at my embarrassments, or at least try to, and tell myself that everyone has memories that make them cringe.

I've gotten rid of more than I want to, and yet somehow I'm keeping more than I expected. I'm keeping yearbooks, and pictures, and silly little gifts that make me smile. I'm keeping the reminders that I've never been alone, not truly, and that once upon a time, I believed I could do anything I set my mind to.