On a packing break I sat down on the sofa, reached out, pressed the power button and a crease of thunder scorched the sky. Not a little thunder, but the ominous, rumbling, “Thor’s coming” kind.
So I pressed the mute button, hoping that would somehow keep us out of the rain. It did. I did not know my remote control was that powerful.
We’re down to the portion of the packing where you’ve put away everything you can live without for at least a few days. This is also known as the portion of the packing where you look around at the things you think you need to live comfortably over the course of the week and wonder “When am I going to pack this stuff?”
I started shredding documents this afternoon. I have a simple little home shredder, surely not meant for industrial use or volume, but it has been resting up over the last several years when I should have been shredding, but postponed the chore. So, today, I looked like a military general, destroying papers as the invading army made its way into my compound.
I shredded a lot of paper. Some things, I picked up the remnants and shredded sideways, just to see what would happen. (Confetti.) I filled three bags with little ribbons of paperwork filled with varying degrees of important material. The years 2000 to 2004 have all vanished, bill-wise. This emptied an entire box and a two-drawer filing cabinet.
There’s still one large box to address at some point in the future. Somehow I’ve convinced myself that this was a good use of a significant portion of my day.
Tomorrow we’ll spend part of the day in the car. Anything to keep from packing.
