ephemera II.

it's that time again - time to move on, and as i began packing up my apartment in preparation to leave this city, i am struck again by a blow to my chest each time something drops from my fingers into the wastebasket. in slow-motion, each scrap of paper i have jotted something upon, each greeting card, or forgotten document seems to fall into the trash with a tremendous crash - the way things do in movies. chatting with mikey who was also in the midst of packing, i have way too much knick-knack shit, he tells me. i ask what sort of knick-knacks. i don't know, i just have crap, he replies. as i look around my room, it is clear that i too, have way too much crap, too many knick-knacks which i have accumulated over the years only to end up taped or hung upon the walls. old posters, a few clipboards, some collages, drawings, a twisted piece of plastic from a two-liter soda botttle, framed postcards, photos, and a french emergency exit sign with an arrow pointing a running figure towards a stairway, everything is crap. everything is nothing more than a memory reified into a piece of tangibility, and despite the demarcations people draw between albeit interesting, piles of crap, boxes of junk, and bags of trash, all are the same - all are collected placeholders, and all are unnecessary.

on a phone call with my mother, she asks how my packing is going and if i know what i need to discard. everything can be discarded, i say, and she quickly responds with an incredulous everything? yes, if it was necessary, everything could be discarded. these are just "things," i explain. sure, it would be great if i could keep most of what i had for reuse, such as my desk, or my bookshelf, or my dresser, but if i could not transport it, then yes, it could be discarded. everything was replaceable. granted while detatching myself from furniture is not terribly difficult, it was clear that i needed to broaden my scope to include the things which had greater sentimental value than monetary value. suddenly, letting go would be harder than first expected. old kretek boxes, with their little orange surfer-dudes who first got me into cloves in the first place, needed to go. old magazines and graduate school rejection letters also needed to go. i still had to contend with the various trinkets i have received from people in the past and the stack of thank you-goodbye cards my second graders made and presented to me the last day i was at school. packing a stack of course readers into a bin which has already become way too heavy with other textbooks, i consider tossing the lot into the recycling bin, but there was just something wrong with throwing knowledge away. despite it being rather unlikely that i would ever read through all these articles again or pass them on to another student, i simply could not bring myself to trash these books. serving as some sort of testament to what i have trudged through and all i have learned, my readers remain. serving as some sort of testament to my accomplishments, a fulilling year, and the places those around me have been, my kiddie-cards and trinkets also remain, packed away to be fogotten some other day.

every so often, i tell myself not to forget the impermanence of all things. i remind myself of the tibetan sand mandalas i have seen created, and more importantly, those i have seen destroyed. it is a very buddhist philosophy to let go of all attachments, and although i am not planning to live an ascetic existence anytime soon, remembering that all things really are just things has allowed me to live more fully, more calmly, more rationally, and splurge more easily for that piece of experience i know will never be the same again. surely, experience is one thing you can't get for nothing, though it is one thing that remains permanent in people's hearts, minds, and memories when their photo albums deteoriate and their loved ones pass away.

talking to kim who is planning to empty her room at home this summer of its accumulated junk, she lets me know that as long as she reminds herself that she lived for a year abroad out of nothing but a meager suitcase, cleaning and discarding should not be a problem. although i too, am reminded by the frivolity of my possessions whenever i travel and have to live out of a small suitcase for months at a time, even doing my laundry in a bathtub, detaching myself from the physical manifestations of my past experiences is suffice to say, difficult. nevertheless, seeing others struggling up staircases with huge pieces of luggage, filled with never-enough-stuff, imparts to me a small sense of satisfaction, knowing that if i needed to, i could make do with little or nothing.

reading enrenreich's nickel and dimed, the notion of getting by with little is only harshly and realisticly reinforced. immersing herself into america's impoverished working class to research how people survive on minimum wage, enrenreich picks up jobs in motel housekeeping and diner waitressing. taking note of the slave-labor-like conditions of her jobs, and the live-out-of-a-van lifestyles of her coworkers, it is clear that trying to get by in "the land of opportunity" is a difficult thing. what is even clearer is how much more i have, at twenty-three, than those far older than me who somehow simply got off to a bad start. just as sting's haunting lyrics of "tomorrow we'll see" streams out the chorus line, don't judge me, you could be me in another life, in another set of circumstances, if they could make it work, so could i. from a new point of view, all the crap and knick-knacks strewn about my room and packed into boxes for storage look even more unnecessary. i've had a good run with most of everything i have, but it is time to move on - time to clear space for new experiences. what i really should do is donate what i no longer need to those who truly need it.

all art is quite useless.
: wilde.