Maarja wrote:
 "Wow, I wouldn't want to burden anyone with too much stuff to go
through, I gotta start throwing stuff away" in my office!


Yeah, I sure understand that one.  I was "Lead Researcher" last year
after both of my parents passed away.  They had been retired for 30
years after a military career of 30 years.  

The accumulation was unbelievable.  They also had been gardeners, so the
little plastic bowls and the like that they saved "because it might be
useful" was in the thousands.  

Not like the pack-rat houses you sometimes hear about, but it looked
like they never threw anything away.   The storage building in back was
held up by the contents.   It took two large dumpsters, and several
sessions of lining the curb with full contractors bags to finish the
chore.

It was an unbelievably sad thing to have to do.

Anyhow, I took the same attitude as you, and came back home, hoping to
clean stuff up, but it is so very hard to do.   Even after a year, I
still have rented temporary storage for the overflow at my home.  

I recently had a conversation with my grown foster son.   He lost
everything to Hurricane Katrina; all their clothes, all the toys,
furniture, and all the family pictures.  Oh yeah, also the new home they
had recently built.  He and wife and three young boys have moved to the
North Shore of Lake Pontchartrain.   He says "The experience has totally
changed my attitude about keeping things, and what is important to me.
I just don't keep things that I might miss if I lost them again."   

I don't really know where I'm going with these thoughts, especially
given the business I'm in.


Sonny Carter
http://www.sonc.com
Digital Imaging Specialist
Cammie G. Henry Research Center
Northwestern State University of Louisiana
Natchitoches, LA

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