I'm a pack-rat (<objects.stuff they'd hung on to over the years that some of it filled a room that had to be at least 300 square feet in size,
, plus another room about 110 square feet (half-full, and leaving about two feet of space to the ceiling), not to mention the other stuff they had about the house for day-to-day living. They've taken at least two 25' truckloads of their
up to Prescott, and I think they may have managed to cram most of their furniture in one of those. Shoot, maybe they used three 25' trucks.
Anyway, some of those boxes were mine from when I packed up and moved out several years ago. I had asked them to find my boxes and hold them for me to pick up so I wouldn't have to haul them down from Prescott sometime in the future. They obliged.
I picked up my boxes the other night. Three filled the trunk of my car, and about six or so others were put in the back seat, with four of the smallest boxes sitting on the floor of the front passenger side. Yes, I could see out my back window, I didn't have
that many! :op All of these boxes spent a good part of their 9 years in an old van outside in the driveway. Keep in mind I live in Phoenix.
Some of it is art stuff. Surprisingly, most of my watercolor tubes survived the heat. I haven't checked the whole set, but the ones I did check still give when squeezed. My oil pastels survived without melting. Several airbrush paints survived without drying out. I also found an airbrush. I never had an air compressor though. Maybe someday I'll get one.
My watercolor paintings survived fairly well, although a little warped. But then, watercolor paper tends to warp anyway, so they were probably that way when I packed them away.
One of the boxes got wet at some point. The van had all its windows, so my parents guess that maybe a seal around one of the doors was rotted and rain came in through the cracks in the door. It was only one box that was damp (still, actually, so it must've been from a recent rain), but unfortunately it was the one that had many of my various awards from school, from junior high through high school. One of those was a letter from a former Arizona Senator congratulating me for one of my paintings having been selected to be displayed in Washington D.C. (the painting now hangs on my living room wall.. I'll photograph it later and post it). The letter has water damage and a little bit of mold on it. :o( Some of the other awards (well, certificates, anyway) have mold on them too. I laid them out to dry and sprayed them with Lysol. I don't want to throw them away, but I don't know what else to do to save them. Maybe I should get them laminated? (not the stiff lamination, but the flexible, thin laminate that three of my certificates from jr. high were covered with, so they are mold and water-damage free).
There were a few books in some of the boxes... "Dragon on a Pedestal" and "Being a Green Mother", by Piers Anthony, and about eight others I can't recall the titles to right off hand.
My yearbooks were in one of the boxes, all six, from jr. high through high school.
And there was lots of other miscellaneous stuff, most of which probably has some sort of sentimental value in one way or another. Some of it I may be able to toss. I've got my work cut out for me in the next week or two.. I had already started to clean my office over the last couple of weekends and had made a little bit of headway, but with these additional boxes that came from my parents house, well, that just adds more to what I already have to do. :o/ Plus I also plan on cleaning the rest of the house, too.
The next two weeks (well, at least one full week) certainly can't be considered any kind of "vacation" for as busy as I intend to be...
That's all, folks...
