There is clutter in my life. In my house filling every room. I feel the need to clean out. But every time I reach for a shirt of Joe's, or a sketch of David's or Tony's chemistry notes I am afraid of losing the past. And I know that if anything is not tossed out without approval I am throwing away the past.
We as a family tend to take hold and keep things down to every scrap of paper to remember our lives. I wonder is it time to give up Joe's clothes? Tony and I cleaned out his notebooks from Freshman year at McCallie to the first year at Penn. It was painful to open the notebooks and see his precise hand writing. I wanted to keep it, but it was time to let go.
I think of what was important to him in the end. His wallet, a pen knife handed down to him from a Grandfather he never met, his Campbell Award, the coins Mike brought back from the Far East, Jonny's Air Force Wings and his Saint Christopher's Medal. All could be held in the palm of your hand.
Yes, it is time to relieve the clutter in my life. But I am afraid by losing the clutter I will lose what my family was.
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