Out with the old...

Last Thursday or so, it occurred to me that my office was a complete disaster... I started toying with the idea of cleaning it up, which I half-heartedly started by trying to clear the Post-It notes off of my desk, monitor, laptop stand, lamp, phone, whiteboard, and whatever other surfaces I had them stuck to... A couple of years ago, for Christmas, Grandma and Grandpa Turner got me a desk set that included what I like to call a Post-It Pike... I use Post-It notes like a maniac. I doodle on them while I’m thinking, scribble snippets of code on them while I’m programming, take notes on them while I’m on the phone, leave reminders to myself on about any surface they will stick to, use them for bookmarks, write down prayer requests, and on and on and on... When I’m “done” with a Post-It, I impale it onto my pike...

Have I mentioned yet, that I am a pack rat? I have a terrible time throwing anything away... I impale my used Post-Its on the pike for a variety of reasons, but mainly b/c there is a lingering whisper in the back of my mind that I might need a phone number, bit of Perl, password, serial number, URL that I’ve scribble on a note that has made it’s way to the pike... Since I got my Post-It Pike, I have filled it up three times, when it finally gets so full that I have to clean it off or more notes won’t fit, then I shuffle the whole lot of them off into a cardboard box or large envelope, then I sign and date a new note and make it the first victim of the now empty pike... ( that way I have a rough idea of how much time has passed between times that I have to clean the stack off ).

When I started to clean my desk last week I realized quickly that all of the Post-Its which needed cleared off of the variety of surfaces would not make the pike, and so I had to clear them... July 5, 2005. That’s when I started the last stack... Crazy huh? I flipped through them, as a pulled them off in clumps and committed them to the small box, where my pre-piked notes find their resting place ( see, I still can’t bring myself to throw them out ) and recalled the phone conversations, projects worked on, groceries picked up, prayers prayed, to-do’s both done and lingering undone...

It is crazy how quickly time gets away from us... I have a two year old daughter, and though I feel like she was born just yesterday, she was almost a year old already when I started the most recent stack of notes on the pike... By the time I clear this stack away there will be another little Roogles running around, Elllie will have settled settled into her role as a big sister, friends will have come and gone, current projects will be packed away, and an entire new set of adventures will be opening up before me...

Out with the old... Here’s looking forward to the new.