You may recall, when I was still going through my stuff, that I found my Castle Grayskull and Snake Mountain, and I posted pictures on my social media. Later that day I realized that these weren't actually the same ones that I had when I was a kid. I mean, I had these as a kid, but these weren't the original ones I had. I was thinking about it more today, and a lightning bolt struck me.
I finally know why I'm a pack rat. Yeah, I like to hold on to things. A lot of things. But I'm not a hoarder. I'm *almost* a hoarder. At least I throw stuff out, and if a pet died I would certainly not pop the li'l guy in my freezer.
When I was a kid living with my mom and stepdad and (at the time) my two brothers, we lived in this shitty apartment by the train tracks. I had to check my shoes every morning for cockroaches. There was no A/C, and the heat was provided by those big coils set in the floor in each room. And, most importantly, I had to always be careful lest I get the shit kicked out of me by my stepdad.
(As an aside, Pee-wee's death this week reminded me of the time my stepdad got my brother, Dan, a toy version of Pee-wee's Playhouse. I wanted to help my brother put it together, and I started applying the stickers. My stepdad stopped me and said that I'd screw it up. I was fairly confident in my ability to put stickers on a fucking toy, so I ignored him. He was right, though, and I did screw it up. When he saw it he whaled the shit out of me for messing up his son's toy.)
Thankfully my grandparents decided to rescue me from his clutches. The unfortunate side effect of this was, I had to surrender nearly all of my possessions. Mom would never let me leave without my clothes and toiletries and things of that nature, so I had to choose what I wanted to keep with me, and it had to fit in my backpack.
What happened when I realized I was going to get kicked out of the house I currently live in? I packed my books first and foremost. Big surprise, that wasn't the first time I did it, because I did the same back then. I shoved every book I could into that backpack, and I carried one of those extending files that contained the stories I'd written back then. To this day I regret that I had to choose between my Hardy Boys books and my Tom Swift books. The Swift books my dad had given me from his own childhood.
Among the things I left behind were all of my He-Man toys. Thankfully I had my Star Wars toys already at my grandparents' house, so no worries there.
Fast forward a couple of years, and I'm about to go into junior high. One of my friends decided to sell all of his toys at his family's garage sale, and guess what I bought off of him that day.
Oh yeah.
I'd never really thought about this before, but the trauma of losing almost all of my possessions stuck with me deeply. Think about the times I wrote about the piñata and the baseball I lost on the Prairie Path and the piggy bank and such. It totally makes sense now, doesn't it? I guess the shrinks call that a "breakthrough." Which means I gotta get rid of stuff now, right?
I think I'm finally going to start doing that. Dusting and cleaning everything off. Selling it off. And maybe throwing some useless shit away, too. My friend's Castle Grayskull and Snake Mountain helped me get through some shit, so maybe now it's time to pass it on. Let the cycle of stuff continue.
Plus I could really use the money. Speaking of which, remember that I have a Patreon? For just a dollar a month you can get weekly updates of stuff I don't even talk about here. Stories I'm working on. I plan to do excerpts from forthcoming works there, and maybe even full short stories. I'm also planning on doing giveaways there, too, so why not join up?
No comments:
Post a Comment