Reading through my recent blog posts I realized that the post I wrote on Saturday didn't make it from my iPhone to the blog. This means that my post "Runover in Threes" doesn't make sense. So, here's the back story.
My "stuff" that has been stored in Houston for three years arrived in the Bay Area last week. Saturday I went to check it out. Although I was able to open the lock on my storage crate it was drilled shut on the top of its door. On the front was a handwritten note saying, "you may want to consider upgrading to a new crate that is in better condition." Just then a man on a forklift came over and I told him that I couldn't open the crate. He took a crowbar and was able to pull most of the door open and then used a drill to remove the screws that were holding the remainder shut.
Finally the door opened and the inside was filled with boxes and boxes of stuff. I instantly felt overwhelmed, having lived so simply for the past three years. The one and only box I opened was filled with memory boxes - memories I had hoped to forget. Some of the storage boxes were crushed.
The helpful man said that I could change storage containers right then and there. But that meant that I would have to unpack this giant crate, the size of a small bathroom, and pack all the stuff up in a new crate. No thanks. He offered to keep this crate near the front door so that it wouldn't fall apart in future moves if I needed to access it again.
It wasn't until I stepped outside that I understood what he was saying. As I walked to the pickup truck I had borrowed for the visit, I noticed some strange papers here and there on the parking lot. They were there when I had arrived but I didn't give them a second look. Now that I did I noticed that they were my photographs and artwork - images I had made in college. They were run over. What was going on? I picked up the various piles and put them in the truck. All I could feel was shock. As I drove out away I noticed another pile of my work several parking lots away. I retrieved that one too. What had happened? How long were they out there?
Telling Rene about the story he helped me figure out what probably had happened. We put all the clues together and realized that the crate probably fell apart in transport and perhaps my stuff started to fall out. That's why the door was drilled shut in places.
The experience was like having my most private thoughts exposed to the world and run over. The only spin I could put on it is that these are the objects that wanted to be with me and therefore made themselves visible. The rest of my things can just go in the dump.
