cleaning out my photos

One of the drawbacks of valuing the story in every little thing is that I have held on to a lot of stuff.

We've been working on simplifying our life at home to create a 'refuge' together and have home be a more peaceful place. I'm really not a packrat but with 900 square feet an extra pile is all you need to have chaos.

I've been going through everything. And I've been nearly ruthless with what's gone out.

A recent a-ha I've had is that I can scan a lot of things I want to keep and get rid of the physical item. For example, I've saved nearly every paper I've written from high school and college. Totally unnecessary, right? So I'll scan them and get rid of them. Done.

Another thought is that I will post an R.I.P. entry for the things I'm getting rid of that mean something to me, and that way, I'll feel like I'll always have it around.

The other thing I'd like to do is really organize my digital space. It's the messiest space I have.

So in cleaning out my school computer, I found three photos I had taken a few springs ago. I brought the photos into school to tell my class about the strange incident that took place one morning.

Before leaving for school, there was all sorts of commotion on my balcony. My cat, Levi, meowed incessantly to alert me to the issue. Two birds were fluttering around on the ledge. They were nearly fighting. I grabbed my camera.

Eventually the second bird flew away, and the first bird laid an egg! Right on my balcony. Unfortunately my camera focused on the screen instead of the bird.

The bird flew away and the egg remained, precariously perched on my third floor balcony ledge. I didn't know what to do. Would the mother bird return?? I left for school and told our librarian about the situation. (She knows a ton about cocoons, insects, birds, you name it.) She looked it up and apparently it was illegal to move the egg. Good thing I didn't touch it, right? I told myself if it was still there when I returned I'd do something.

I came home and it was gone. And it hadn't splattered beneath my balcony. I'm sure it was lunch for something. What a bizarre little moment!