Shredding the Past

I'm packing because whether I stay or whether I leave I still have to get the heck up out of my house because I am renting it out. My mom bought me a shredder (Thanks Mom!) and it has to be one of the best presents I have ever received because I was desperately in need of it.

I have been shredding so much that the shredder has overheated several times. I guess it wasn't built for the high powered shredding I have been doing. Being the pack rat that I am it feels so good to throw away stuff...lots of stuff. I have thrown away so many garbage bags of stuff I have lost count. And I guess because of the size of my house I didn't think I had that much stuff to throw away, but apparently I do.

Since 1999 I have been lugging all my NABJ stuff from state to state. And today I looked at it and said you know what, that is two years of my life that I'm ready to get rid of. I remember what I did and I don't necessarily need to keep a copy of all the crap to know what I did during my term of service to the organization both while on the Board of Directors and after serving on the BOD. So with a little bit of guilt I'm shredding that part of my life. The guilt is because NABJ is a 30 year old organization whose record keeping in the past hasn't always been great. A lot of the history of the organization from the early years can be found in the attics, basements and closets of members and former board members from those years. But I'm going to hope and pray that the record keeping is good enough now that I don't have to keep a record in my home. Plus I know Hurricane will forever keep the copies of his stuff from that time because he is more of a pack rat than I am.

Does anyone feel me on the pleasure of shredding (or shedding) the past? And as soon as I know if I'm staying or leaving I'll make an announcement to the world. I have not heard from the city of Sandy Springs so I'm going to proceed as if I'm moving to NYC. The movers will be here on Thursday January 5. And I think the shredder has cooled off from the last overheating so I'm back to shredding my past.