Mark my words — if I don’t stop myself while I’m ahead, I will end up on Hoarders in 30 years’ time. The contents of my closet include the following:
- a tap costume wrapped in three plastic bags to prevent it from vomiting glitter all over my closet (all of Nevada Ballet was covered in glitter for weeks after three of us wore this costume for recital one year. I hate to think what would have happened if they had dressed the entire Youth Company in glittery tutus for Giselle… we would have had to convert the building into a new branch of the Liberace Museum)
- every note I ever received between the ages of 12-15, a period during which we passed a veritable crapton of notes. I can probably toss the vast majority of these because I don’t think there’s any reason to remember the kinds of horrible fights we used to carry out and resolve through notes when we were 13… but my sentiment won’t let me throw out all the notes the boy from freshman year Geometry wrote me. Hello, I need proof that I once seduced someone ENTIRELY THROUGH THE POWER OF MY HANDWRITING.
- all of the plastic flowers I got backstage during four years of dance concerts at my high school. Which was a lot, because obviously I was really popular. Actually, no, my parents just always got them for me and there were three shows a year.
- the kicker: the movie ticket from my first date. In an envelope marked “This is the movie ticket from my first date.”
I’ll save a lot of what I found in my closet. Most importantly, I’ll save the years and years’ worth of diaries and journals that I’ve kept somewhat consistently since seventh or eighth grade. Looking back through my older journals is a TRIP. First off, I have long suspected that I was a certifiable nutball when I was younger and to read what I wrote back then… yes. I was cray. I feel really bad for all those poor preteen boys I had TERRIFYINGLY INTENSE CRUSHES on because they probably had to shell out for some serious protection after all the fear-for-their-lives I instilled in them. Really, in retrospect, my drunk-texting habit doesn’t seem so bad. Judging by the path I was on in those days, I’m kind of surprised I haven’t turned into that lady who wore diapers so she could drive to her stalk her ex without having to stop to pee.
All that aside, I’ve always loved diving back into my old journals to see what psychological meltdowns I’ve gotten over since any given day. It’s one of my favorite activities, and I unearthed some long-lost GEMS in my older journals. (Most notable: the list of “Reasons Why I Should Not Like T_____,” circa 2002. Best reason: “He called me ‘spawn of evil.’”) Before I box up my journals, I want to make a list of the best journal entries of the past 15 or so years, because there are some doozies in there.
But after that? I’m boxing them up. I’m packing them away, sending them to Spokane to the new house, and not looking at them until I get older. They lose their magic when you’ve read them too many times, which is what’s happened with my college journals. I know them cover to cover and I want to forget them again so I can continue to live my life with the clueless, unjaded abandon that has led me on so many adventures. I don’t need to remind myself what it was like to be 18 and miserable, 19 and crazy, 20 and floundering, 21 and sick. I’m 22 and happy and healthy (well, getting there) and fabulous and going confidently in the direction of my dreams. I lived through all that shit already and I don’t need to do it again.
But before then… stay tuned, for you, too, may learn the reasons why I should not like T_____, circa 2002.
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