Struggling to Avoid the Email Tsunami
I've had some success at eradicating excess "stuff" from my life. It feels wonderful to take a load to Goodwill, and even better to take the second and third load. Still, I am regularly innundated by unfinished projects, particularly those mounting piles of paper.
Two anecdotes shed a light in the dark times.
Years ago, things were bleak in my house, piles of paper had gained the ascendancy. Then I was forced to box things up. Perhaps I was moving, perhaps I hired a housekeeper. Whatever. The need was pressing. I put the most urgent of urgent in a box labelled, "Important Papers! Get to soon."
Ten years later, I still have that box. I have not peeked inside, yet life has gone on. Whatever is in there is apparently not urgent. Sentimental letters from children are unanswered. There are humorous clippings I haven't read for years. Bills went unpaid, yet I am not in debtors' prison.
I hopefully read a New York Times article, "Struggling to Avoid the Email Tsunami." What a piece of rubbish. It lauds heroes of the past who dealt with staggering volumes of mail by answering them immediately.
An anecdote from David, sexy, cute, witty David. When he left his parents' house in South Africa and came to America to further his education, he left two boxes behind. One was labelled, "Keep." Another was labelled, "Give away." He asked his parents to give away the "Give away" box.
I know what you're thinking. That wasn't what happened. His father did not throw the wrong box out. Instead, his father didn't know which was which, so he kept both. After a few years, the labels faded. And when David went home and found the two boxes with illegible labels, he looked inside... and couldn't remember which was which.
Which to keep, which to toss.
When I die who will worry about those piles of paper? All those projects that I absolutely must get to... all those letters that require an answer... all the treasures in unread magazines... It's all just dust in the wind.