Memories contained in stuff

So it has started. What hopefully will be the final dispersal of our stuff. We have boxes for trash--did we really haul 3 boxes of just trash stuff around since 2009?? There is a shred / burn destroy all "evidence of" box. There is only one of those--may be because we still have some papers we think are important? And we have the box of "shouldn't we keep this" stuff. Papers from our hound dogs adoptions, marriage, diviorce, and some school papers from 1995 that for some reason seem important.
Then we have the chotzky boxes. Those items we hold on too for so long we forget we had them. The salt and peper shakers my grandmother had. The shakers that look like pheasants, ducks and other assorted animals. Old bumper stickers of radio stations now gone and forgotten. The original sales receipt for my "THIS END UP" corner shelf unit I bought in 1983. I still have the shelf, as well as a file cabinet and the large bookcase. All made from Carolina pine. We have boxes of trinkets we had at one time set out around the house.
Mary found several CD-roms that had some great stuff. One had a lot of genealogical stuff related to my great-grandmother, a full blood Cherokee and her people--HIGHTOWER. Another CD had 600 pictures we had downloaded off the computers before we left Michigan. On ot are pictures of our house when we first moved in. Then the interior after we had lived in it 3 months and ripped the walls, flooring, plumbing and electrical out. We lived in it while we were renovating the entire house. We literally removed 5 walls and eliminated 3 rooms. When we were finished all we had left on the main floor was a bathroom and wide open space from the kitchen to the livingroom. We had to add 3 lam-beams where we tookout support walls--one beam was 24 foot across and supported the entire upstairs!
Then there were pictures of our dogs. Kramer (2004) and Lola (2006)came along when we thought the restored Craftsman house was our forever home. As we looked through the recently discovered pictures, we found pictures of our first rescue dog--Darla. She was a Australian Shepherd-Husky mix. We had seen another dog on the adopt a pet segment of the morning news and Mary wanted to see if "Jake" was still available. As it happened, so did 20 other people. I guess people want to adopt the dog that was on televison so they can tell all their friends? Anyways, we saw Darla and that was all she wrote. 8 months later Darla was taken sick and died. 3 months later the contaminated dog food story broke. We had been feeding her Iams diet--which was number one on the list of contaminated food...
But I suppose that is why pictures are important. The one regret I have related to my TransAmerica bicycle trip is that I didn't take a camera. Perhaps the thing to do is track down the other 11 riders and see what pictures they have. It would be a great excuse for a reunion huh?
One of the last pictures on the CD is of Mary and me with my siblings and their wives and kids taken with my mom at Yogi Bear at Lake Barton Indiana.
That was the year before she passed and the last time we were all together.
There is stuff we just cannot afford to lose.