This is a post of humble failure to progress. Friends, decluttering (etc) has been harder than I imagined. It's not like a marathon or chronic illness or anything, but getting rid of stuff isn't easy for me. I thought once I started doing so more regularly, it would be effortless to part with, for example, those nasty shoes that sit in the garage. They're only nasty because of their history (actually notbad-looking old running shoes), which includes both having accompanied my feet on a sharkdiving trip, which resulted in both puke (mine) and guts (fish's) smeared across the laces and soles, and an academic year in gross anatomy lab, which also resulted in other-guts (remember that time the floor was so slippery . . . ?) becoming embedded into the stitching. These shoes were part of very potent memories. And! I haven't ever worn them inside since. And! They've been literally collecting dust for years. Toss them, right? I'm not there yet. Perhaps I'll follow the advice of some, and give them a little photo shoot first. Stay tuned.
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He was eleven years old and answering all sorts of semi-embarrassing questions. His mom prodded him to answer in more detail, and said she wished he were smarter. His two year old sister sat in the stroller, dozing. It was a rough-sad few minutes as we sat in the clinic room, methodically going over some of the challenges of being eleven. Then, his sister woke and smiled at him. They played a little game with a business card. A game of peek-a-boo/tug-o-war that they had clearly played before and had invented for each other. He made his sister laugh. She grinned with admiration. He grinned back with love.
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