We were cleaning out the basement tonight, as we work towards our goal of going through everything down there and getting the basement ready to be "finished" (by the time we finish cleaning it, we will have the spare change to afford remodeling. It's a long-term goal).
Anyway, my task tonight was several boxes of papers from my school and work days. And so I journeyed back in time through college, grad school, and my first, second, and third big museum jobs. There were syllabi from favorite classes, papers I'd written on Pygmalion and on Dutch genre paintings, transcripts from my three schools, bibliographies from my oral exams, folder upon folder from my dissertation research and writing including numerous edited outlines and drafts, plus grant applications from programs I created and administered, fliers for lectures I gave, outlines for tours, drafts and final proofs of articles I published, programs from conferences I presented at, emails and letters from colleagues all over the world, and everything from articles working with special needs visitors to photocopies of 19th-century British parliamentary records.
It was amazing, inspiring even, to be reminded of everything I had done, things so far from where I am now. And it was also very liberating to toss (actually, recycle) so much of it--I just won't ever need outlines, notes, edits, and copies of Chapter 2 anymore! Nor do I need a complete bibliography on art of the ancient Near East, with a focus on Assyrian cylinder stones. And I've given enough tours that I didn't need to keep "nitty gritty notes on designing a docent tour." But I did keep every photocopy I ever made of museum cartoons in Punch. I know I have another Punch article in me, probably on museums and the marriage market in late 19th-century London. And I kept three edited drafts of my complete dissertation, one each from three of my readers, including complimentary emails from my advisor. And I kept several outlines from talks I gave in Chicago. Plus syllabi from my favorite undergraduate art history classes, just in case I ever need inspiration for my own teaching.
Oddly, happily, I wasn't depressed by any of this, as I thought I might be. I really enjoyed the walk down memory lane. Sometimes I get in a real funk about having so completely left my academic, achieving, career-oriented self so far behind and become fearful that I won't ever be able to reclaim some part of that self again. I miss it at times, even if I love being a stay-at-home-mom to the kiddos. But reading through it all brought it back so vividly, so clearly, so immediately, that I know with just some effort, I could be back in the swing of it again. I was strongly reminded of how much I really do love it. And when it's time, there are 8 folders of cartoons from Punch just begging to be explored and explained.
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