Working to tidy up our spare bedrooms, I found myself uncovering relics from a previous era of my life. Suitcases that were put into action every month, a laptop wheelie bag that accompanied me to the office and the plane, business clothing, crafts and other projects from before my vision loss.
When I returned home from the hospital after a week’s stay at the onslaught of my blindness, these items remained where I left them on a typical Sunday night. They stayed where they were as I waited for my sight to return. As the months passed and I regained some vision but not enough to return to my life, the things were moved, pardon the pun, out of sight. It was difficult to have these things around as I worked to accept my compromised eyesight. Days, then weeks, then months continued to fly by, as they do, and I began to slowly reinvent myself and stay busy in this darker world that was my new normal.
As I unearth these artifacts in my summer cleaning extravaganza, with the help of the equipment I now have some of these old pursuits are once again possible. I will begin to dust them off and determine what they are and what place they now have in my life. It is so true that priorities change once your health has been compromised as mine and my husband’s has been and after you have watched your mom take her last breath. But do I still sweat the small stuff? You bet I do. I am still human, still Type A, still me. So it will be interesting to see the set aside objects with fresh eyes (lots of irony there) and decide what gets displayed, donated, thrown away or put back into the rotation of my life.
We are all archeologists of our own lives. The remains of our past: materials, memories and knowledge, show us who we once were and who we aspired to be. The dig through the ruins of my old life may be a bit emotional but I am ready to visit my past and introduce it to my future.
