Struggle

About a year or two ago my parents decided to get the floors redone in the house. At this time I was away in Los Angeles and had not control over what was going to happen to my room. Consequently, everything I owned was placed half-assedly into boxes. No method to the madness. No consideration either - after finding a bottle of baby oil leaking on top of personal sentimental items such as high school yearbooks and other mementos. In past visits home, I have avoided my bedroom completely so I wouldn’t have to deal with cleaning it up and slept in the tv room. Fortunately or Unfortunately, this lazy avoidance did not work out this winter. My allergies have gotten worse or this house has gotten dustier (safe to say that it’s both). A house with 5 cats, 2 dogs, and tons of dust collecting furniture has made this trip hard to breathe. Recognizing the importance of clean air, I moved back into my bedroom. I have opened up the window to air out the room (it’s been a closed room with stale air for probably a year) and have began to deconstruct the boxes. It is not as easy as I thought it was going to be. It’s going through over a decade years of “stuff” I have accumulated. I am more of a pack rat than I remembered. From the looks of it, I archived everything! Every magazine I ever read, every stuffed animal I ever received, every bag I ever used… somehow I had kept in my room. Ridiculous. I found my drivers permit, tons of photos, my “Blossom” hat (circa ‘92), all my high school notes, grades, papers, a plethora of cd cases (with no cds), individual socks missing their partners, clothes, etc. It’s an intense and slow process to sift through these things. Each picture I want to look at, each old shirt I want to try on. Reflection on the way it used to be. Quite the purging / detoxing experience. But, this is what I have been doing the past few days. As no-fun as it sounds, it is making me feel more comfortable at home. This trip has been unexplainably hard for me and now I am thinking it was because I didn’t have my own space. Because I am FINALLY going through everything, I am making it comfortable for the 25 year old Meg (and hopefully the future Meg) and not trying to live in the messy space the 18 year old Meg left behind….