There is something relaxing about shredding

Published 8:34 am Monday, February 8, 2010

The paper shredder at my house got a workout on the weekend. It whirred away for hours. Sam, my faithful pooch, even deserted me as I piece by piece demolished part of my past life. I think he was afraid that I would shred him too.

The great shredding event happened because of my resolution to pare down. My house is probably one of the few homes left that still has its Christmas decorations adorning the various rooms. The reason my Christmas season has lasted as long as it has is because of my relentless reserve that I am not putting the decorations away until I have cleared the back room of my basement. My giveaway box is full. My eBay boxes are stacked neatly waiting for auction and the shelves have spaces to neatly store my Christmas decorations.

There is one corner left that needs purging. It is the corner where old tax documents visit never to return to daylight again. It was time to jump into the fray and tackle the dreadful paper clutter.

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I started with the year 1998. There is something to be said for holding on to documents that are at least 10 years old. I was able to revisit where I was in my financial life 10 years ago. Was I better off then or now? I am not going to tell you. I am going to tell that I was not any better organized then than I am now.

It seems my methods of organization was to heap things into a pile and throw them in a box. So one recent Saturday I pulled my chair by the shredder and paper by paper I shredded my past.

The first thing I realized was my relaxation level. There was something very relaxing about sitting by the shredder and piece by piece letting go of pieces of my life. Possibly it was the fact that I was ridding myself of some of the clutter but it had more to do with being silent and still except for the whirring of the blades of the shredder.

In the mess of 1998 I found letters from my mother. In 1998 I had to put my mother in a nursing home. Being an only child the decision was mine but many people outside the family had an opinion and made my decision harder. My mom had Alzheimer’s and her moods were very volatile especially against me. She could be very convincing to an outsider if they only spent a little time with her. The decision was a very painful one and I have always second guessed myself with the what ifs.

Finding the letters she had written to me during that year made me realize that the decision I had made was the right one to keep her safe from herself. The letters made no sense. They made me sad and I wondered why I had kept them and why I had thrown them in my tax box. What a gift those letters now were 12 years later. Not only did they help me see reality, they were a part of my mother even if they made no sense. There was something very comforting reading something in her familiar handwriting. I must admit I could not bear to shred those letters.

There is something freeing about shredding your past. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could put our mistakes, our sadness, and parts of our lives into that shredder? Wouldn’t it be nice if we could shred the things we are ashamed of? When we were done shredding the parts of our past that are uncomfortable, we could go on to living a new life knowing that we could always shred the old parts that are holding us back and wearing us down?

Well, Sam finally realized I wasn’t going to shred him so he became very interested in my task. I had to watch out so his nose didn’t get caught in the shredder. I wish I could say that I have ran out of things to shred but alas that is not so. Occasionally as I was shredding I would find a paper that documented an event in my life that I wanted to forget about. Something that I wanted to let go of so I could move on.

I decided that as I shredded that piece of paper I was shredding whatever event it was that held unpleasant memories for me and I was letting it go. I didn’t know when I started my shredding project that instead of a chore it was going to be a freeing experience.

“Those who are free of resentful thoughts surely find peace.” Buddha Quote

Wells resident Julie Seedorf’s column appears every Monday. Send e-mail to her at thecolumn@bevcomm.net .Her blog is paringdown.wordpress.com. Listen to KBEW AM radio 1:30 p.m. Sundays for “Something About Nothing.”