Toward a new beginning

To shred or not to shred, that is the question.

Wordsworth had the right idea, over two centuries ago:

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers

We diet and shed. Cycle and burn. Recycle and gloat.

At the storage locker, the Stygian sentinels look on as we sing like mad Lone Rangers: "To the dump, to the dump, to the dump-dump-dump." We are the Walkyries of the landfill.

There is no Presidential Library for our cancelled checks, no Smithsonian to archive our memories. No one wants our souvenirs and keepsakes, our heirlooms, our valued trinkets

We hesitate over all those albums, those yellowing postcards from the past. To savor and save? Or turn and toss?

And in the end, we return our tokens to the cashier, even though there is no refund.