Blue Bin Has Insight In Store

Per T., my significant other, I drove my newly repaired automobile to our storage unit, H106B, in Chula Vista. Upon opening H106B, I saw a mini-barbecue teetering on top of a box tall enough to house wrapping paper, labeled "Christmas" in T.'s choppy hand. At this juncture, I craned my head ceiling-ward, realizing that T.'s storage beautification goal was going to be something of a joke. The 6'x10' unit was crammed with all manner of crap.

After schlepping boxes and rifling through the contents, I found items including but not limited to: poetry written by an old boyfriend (which was not as brilliant as I had remembered), poetry written by me (whose brilliance had been forgotten), a photograph of my grandfather as a lifeguard (McNeills: good looking people), dozens of CD cases with no CDs (where were those CDs?), books by great authors (that I will never read), camping gear (that we will never use), Peter Gabriel concert tickets (big date with T.), photos of me (when I was all that), a Christmas tree stand (Awww…), etc.

Some items made it into the Goodwill pile; some were trashed; some either went back into storage or were tagged to come home with me.

I finally unearthed one of the largest blue storage bins, one containing T.'s old clothes. Examining them, I realized that this was quite a find, as all the fashions were defunct and hopelessly over-sized for T.'s athletic physique. One pair of cargo shorts was worth two of T. at his present weight, and I was delighted. I would be able to dispose of a slew of junk in one fell swoop.

Muscling the blue bin into the car proved to be another matter, and I practiced some Fengshuification in order to position it in the backseat. I smiled, knowing that Goodwill, and maybe even God, would appreciate me for practicing such generosity.

On the way home, though, I eyed the blue bin in the backseat, and I felt a pang of uneasiness. After all, a storage unit was there to house all the things that one didn't really need but couldn't bear to part with, and I thought I ought to get a green light before I went and gave away T.’s stuff, even though he had initiated the cleaning project to begin with.

Upon returning home, it proved that my instincts were correct. When I mentioned to T. that I had the storage bin in my car, he flipped out. “Don’t get rid of it! Don’t get rid of it! I just put that in there three months ago!”

I countered, “But you’ll never wear those clothes again!”

T. didn’t try to disagree with me. He merely said, “I thought that storage was a good first step.”

“OK, OK…” I acquiesced.

At first.

After all, he was the one that wanted H106B cleaned out. A good first step? Not enough of a step for me. I figured that if I was sent all the way down to the storage unit to face the past and start dealing with crap, the least T. could do to participate was get rid of remnants of his past in the bargain.

As any good woman involved in the process of persuasion, I waited a while before bringing up the topic again. In this case, it was through flattery and an appeal to charity that I hoped to bring about the desired change. I waited for an appropriate window in the conversation when I opened my mouth, “You know, you’ll never fit into those clothes again, and somebody out there might need them.”

“They’re my clothes,” T. responded.

Now, T. is a firm believer in finishing what you start in a decent time frame, but me, not so much. I didn’t run back to the storage unit with the blue bin, and instead flatly procrastinated. While driving, the bin loomed in the backseat, reminding me of my inevitable, onerous return to H106B.

T. was acutely aware of the procrastination dynamic and offered irritably, “Do you want me to go to the storage unit?”

“No,” I replied, but I still harbored a shred of hope left that I could liberate the contents of the blue bin at Goodwill and that the old clothes would not be languishing in the unit with all the other outdated and sometimes unwanted memories.

At this point, my hope had become toxic. I was still attached to an idea that wasn’t going to happen, waiting for someone else, in this case T., to change his mind when it wasn’t going to change.

I also clung to the idea that if I waited around, the blue bin would magically take care of itself, that I would get what I wanted simply by willing the clothes out of existence instead of dealing with reality. Reality had developed hard edges, and I wasn’t ready to give up my shred of hope, hope that promised convenience, ease, and deliverance.

The blue bin still sits in the back of my car. But now that I’m extinguishing my hope, toxic hope, my will to deal with my blue bin is mounting. My to do list has another entry, and though beautification of H106B is no longer the goal, and least I feel ready—mostly ready—to deal with what in truth is my own mess.

H106B and I have another date tomorrow.