Culling

Lately I've been thinking. A lot. Now, if you know much about me you know that this isn't normal.  I do things, I don't think about them. I am a person of action, not a person of thought.  I have all these thoughts and all these ideas lately that have been taking over my mind and driving me crazy.  Perhaps all this thinking has been prevoked by the changes that have been happening my my life lately.  For starters, I got my own room this week.  My sister and I were sharing for the last year and we've recently switched to each having our own.  Going through every paper, every bobby pin, every... old assignment in my room has really shown me how much crazy stuff has happened in just one year.  It's also shown me what I value.  The first thing I went through was my box labelled "Capernwray Happiness."  And that's what it is to me.  It's a place I go (be it "healthy" or not) when I need a pick me up, when I need to be reminded that there is joy in the world and everything's not so bad.  I looked through this box with no intention of throwing anything out, and I didn't.  I simply wanted to reminise and relive what are now merely memories.  Then, I found letters. Letters from boys.  Which I had resentfully shoved in an envelope labelled "BOYS-PAST TENSE."  These letters were like stepping into someone else's life. The thoughts and the feelings were so distant and foreign that it was almost as though i'd never felt them at all. But I had. And that's the crazy part to me.  In some senses, I am a completely different person then I was last summer, even last Christmas. But in some ways, so much the same.  I put the letters back in the envelope, because you never know when you'll need to shed a good tear.  I also found my highschool year book, letters and pictures from friends in high school.  Letters from people that said "we'll be friends forever." I haven't talked to most of those people in two years.  There's nothing wrong with that, they had good intentions at the time. But now, I look at the people in my life.  I think about us all being pregnant at the same time, or getting together for dinners with our families, and then I wonder if this is just another season.  If the people in my life now will go their own directions like everyone prior to them did.  It's not that I like the thought.  The people in my life now are wonderful people.  But why wouldn't we go our separate ways when things become more important then our friendship?  Culling through my room has been a lot more than sorting through papers. It's been culling through my life.  It's forced me to consider what I value, what I don't want to be throwing out a year from now. Who I care about, what I care about, where I want to be.  It's been an experience.