Family Matters

What better way is there to spend a gloomy weekend than by cleaning out a storage closet? I do this often, and one would think mine would be nearly empty by now. But, alas, the file boxes seem to be breeding and having new, little file boxes between purgings. As I moved things around, this time, I came upon a bright, red cardboard carton labeled “Family.” I knew it had file folders in it because my entire life is in file folders, but I didn’t remember what I had filed or why. So, I hauled it out and began to revisit the past.

There was a folder for each member of my immediate family: my mother, my father, my sister, and each of my daughters. We were all great letter writers before the advent of hastily tossed-off e-mails. There were letters to and from all of us — some hand written, others, typed. The letters conveyed apologies, confidences, congratulations, condolences, explanations, and the latest news from camp. Nothing went on in our family that did not make its way into a letter.

There were cards for every occasion and no occasion that eloquently said happy birthday, happy Mothers’ Day, I’m sorry, thank you, and I love you. There were report cards, college grades, and papers written for school. There were resumes and detailed applications for jobs. There was specially designed stationery with logos. (Who but my daughters would have their first resumes printed on designer letterhead?) There were photographs, though not many, because I filed them in different folders.

There were two-line notes my father used to send with money and many renderings of the “Good Ship Lollipop,” which I think was the only thing he ever drew. There were articles I wrote that I didn’t remember writing, my sister’s very funny “saga” about her daughter’s first year away at college, and the eulogies she and I wrote when our parents died.

We think we’ll never forget these things, but we are wrong. That’s why we keep scrapbooks and photo albums — so we will remember the moments of our lives. Maybe it’s my age that caused me look through that box to see what others might find someday. My younger daughter recalls when we were cleaning out my mother’s apartment and she came across a fancy gift ribbon. “Why would grandma have kept this? she asked. No one knew. Since then, she has been busy putting everything she owns in cute little containers with labels on them so there will be no such mysteries in her life.

Maybe that’s why I’m reexamining the contents of all my file boxes. I want people to know what mattered most to me and why.