May: Hand Print

From Hand print

What's this photo of?

It's my hand print from when I was 7.

Here's the question I really want to answer:

Why do I have a photo of my hand print?

The answer is not, "I took it to put in my blog."

So:

When I was in graduate school, I had a lot of stuff. Much of it was "just in case" or "for later," like my extra VCR or a book from Japan. (I can't read Japanese, yet.) One reason I kept a lot was the philosophy, "Why not? It can't hurt to have it around."

Then one day, for some reason I forget, I had an epiphany: Having a lot of stuff can hurt. In fact, it was draining my energy. For example, if I had a book on my shelf that I hadn't read, I'd always see it and be annoyed. It might be just a little frustration, and mostly subconscious, but that stuff has a way of adding up. Like termites eating a house.

So when I was about to graduate and move home, I did a 180-degree turn: Instead of trying to squeeze everything into my car, I started giving stuff away.

Suddenly, I had switched from packrat to minimalist. I felt a lot better, and I would even brag that I could fit everything I owned into the trunk of my car. I moved from San Francisco to Seattle to Los Angeles that way.

However, I actually still had a lot of stuff. Back in my old home in Sacramento, all my belongings from childhood, high school and college were still there. Maybe Mom should've forced me to move everything out, but she didn't. And now that I've moved back home, it's time to downsize again.

I downsize by asking different questions. For example:

"If there were a fire in our house and this item burned, would I be heartbroken?"

"If I were moving again, would I take this with me? What if I were moving to Africa?"

"Do I really want this object, or will a photo of it suffice?"

And that's why I have a photo of my hand print: The hand print was clay, and I kept it on a shelf in my room for almost 30 years. Neat, right? However, I knew that, if the clay broke, I'd be sad for a moment, then I'd get over it. So one day, back in May, I took the print of clay, sat with it to play, then went to the garbage and threw it away.

But first, I took a nice photo of it.

"Just in case."