Wood Panels

My dad moved from Lakeville up to Falcon Heights a few years ago, probably when I was in 11th or 12th grade. I was somewhat resentful at this, resentful that my dad got remarried, resentful that she didn't want to live where we had lived happily ever since I was born. How could she make him leave a home full of memories, a neighborhood filled with old friends, a beautiful yard? As such, I refused to help in the move, considering it my prerogative as a teenager newly full of angst. Needless to say, my room which had been depository of my belongings forever, was simply shoveled into boxes and shipped up to St. Paul, where it was promptly left in my "room" in the basement. Since I never considered this new house to be home, I didn't bother to unpack anything. And as time went on and bitterness faded, I simply didn't want to bother with it.

Considering that I'll be spending a fair amount of my life in this basement during the next three years, I figured it was about time to do something about all this shit.

It's really somewhat shocking, I never knew I had so many Farmington High School academic planners, or obscure music awards. Nor all this Minnesota Twins stuff, though I suppose I should have guessed that. It's just kind of bizarre, shoveling through all this stuff from another era. I ran across some photos of my senior prom and graduation, and was somewhat taken aback. Typically I only see the professional photos that were taken of both events, it's strange to see how slovenly I looked through my dad's candid lens. Why the hell was I wearing Vans with dress khakis at our band banquet? Did I realize I looked like a heroin junkie? So strange to see a girl who, at the time, meant everything to me. Now, she's just like everything else. I have a notebook at my mom's, that I used to use as a sort of journal in mid-high school. Incredibly embarrassing, to be sure, it's full of juvenile pinings for this individual or another and what now seems like pointless angst. Usually about once a year I pull it out just to remember how ridiculous I was. I suppose hindsight is 20-20, but isn't that funny, how something so intense at the time can be looked back on as being so insane? Nothing from back then seems real anymore, but it surely was. I guess I'm just sort of amazed at how different a person I used to be four years ago.

A couple key finds:

Autographed photo of Kirby Puckett (basically my prized possession of middle school)
A bulletin board covered in scouting awards
My 5th grade baseball picture on a Wheaties box
5 Orange Dollars from Farmington Middle School (pretty sure those should have been cashed in say, 9 years ago)
A 6th grade adjective project where Sebastian the Macaw takes a world tour

You get the idea.

It's just funny, I spent most of the summer trying to make my mom's basement presentable, just sort of ignoring the fact that I was going to be spending more time up here. And of course, no one ever came over. Now I'm sitting in a wood paneled time capsule from 8th grade, much closer to where other folks live. Oh well. Life is full of small challenges.