Thursday Thirteen—what I uncovered in my office

Today we’re having new carpet installed in my home office and the stairs to the upper level and the lower level and the upstairs hall (same pattern).  But everything had to be moved out of the office (not things on the wall shelves).  To move the desk, everything had to be taken out of the drawers and I found a rolling 25 gallon tub for that. To move a 3 shelf unit for photo albums, all had to be moved.  The computer, modem, wifi, phone, etc. had to relocated temporarily. It’s just amazing what turns up in a move—even a move from the office to the dining room.

1.  A birthday letter to me from my mother from 1996.  She died in 2000, and I didn’t pack away that letter, but wasn’t real sure where it was.   Like having her here to tell me about the day of my birth and why my nickname was “Peachy.” 

2.  Lots of homemade cards from my friend Lynne.  We’ve been friends since high school.  I have a scrap book for her cards and poetry, but somehow a little sack of them stayed behind in my desk.

3.  A box of note cards with a Frank Lloyd Wright design, plus lots of miscellaneous cards, many as mementoes from museums and travels, from the days when I did less e-mail and more personal notes.

4.  A little stamp with my name on it from when I was a Slavic language cataloger at the University of Illinois library. I think the main entry card was stamped with the cataloger’s name in case there was a problem.

5.  A set of weights my daughter gave me for Christmas 2 years ago, 3 lb.., 5 lb., 8 lb.  Almost like new.  They were hard to move.

6.  The first issue of George magazine.  I collect first issues of serials, and this one didn’t get into the storage box when I rearranged my collection 2 years ago.

7.  Scissors for crafts.  Zig zag, shaped patterns, etc.  I’m not crafty, so not sure why I bought them. It was probably either a good deal or I had a flash of ambition that dissipated before I got home.

8.  Pennies, twisty ties,paper clips, mystery keys to suitcases I no longer have and rubber bands too brittle to use.

9.  A letter with the last 41 cent postage stamp on it (I’d made a note on the envelope).

10. A photo of my sister and me from 2002 printed from my computer, but I don’t seem to have either a digital copy or print of it.

11. Lots of carefully saved instructions, guarantees, warranties, for digital stuff I almost never use or have replaced.

12. A very nice, never used color coded notebook with 3 x 5 cards. 

13. A faded poem on yellow lined paper from my husband written in 1960 on the anniversary of our first date.  It was probably in the desk because I repacked that box of memorabilia when we moved here, and so it surfaced 11 years later.

If you’d like to play Thursday Thirteen, or read along, you can join in.