Memory, realisation, and the Swedes

Facebook “Memories” can be interesting, showing us things we’ve forgotten about, good times, maybe bad times, maybe things we were even proud of. Even so, and despite appearances, I never mention the vast majority of “Memories” that Facebook serves me, and when I do share one here, it’s either to reminisce or to use it as a starting point for commentary of some sort. This post is the latter sort, but one of the “Memories” Facebook showed me today (screenshot above) was about something I don’t seem to have even mentioned here, let alone shared the photo—not at the time or since. That’s not what struck me about it, though: It made me realise something that I’d never thought of before.

The “Memory” was about something I posted on August 13, 2021, soon after I found the AOL diskette in a box in the garage. The text may not be clear, so here’s what I wrote three years ago:

Going through stuff stored in the garage means going through some boxes of my own stuff that I packed up “quite some time ago”. Didn’t know I’d find any antiques, though. Takes one to know one, I suppose. But, seriously: A *floppy disk*?! 😯 I remember when those AOL disks (then CDs) were everywhere. Also, I really am an antique. 😕

I never shared that moment here on this blog, just on Instagram, which automatically posted it to my personal Facebook (which is how it showed up today as a “Memory”). However, I never shared that photo or story here, which is similar to the “Memory” I wrote about on Sunday. In both cases, I have no idea why I didn’t share the photos here at the time.

The bigger thing for me, though, was a sudden realisation: Many people have things they feel should “go to family” when they die, and I do, too. In fact, I was recently thinking about some of the stuff from my childhood that I planned to put altogether so someone can send it to the USA after I’m gone, but then it suddenly hit me: no one will want that stuff. Sure, they might get a kick out of seeing some of it, but after that it should be disposed of—but they might feel guilty doing that.

This is exactly the dilemma that many families face: What to do when you’re willed grannie’s prized china? She loved it, but it might be hopelessly old-fashioned (and not in a good way), and if it’s not even valuable, the recipient will be left feeling they need to store something they don’t want.

There are solutions, of course. For example, before getting rid of inherited stuff, a recipient could ask other members of the family if they want it—maybe someone truly does! But I’ve come around to thinking “Swedish Death Cleaning” is more or less on the right track, though I certainly didn’t think so when I mentioned it back in January 2018. My thoughts about changed, something I talked about in November 2021:

I inherited huge piles of Nigel’s stuff, things that I now have to dispose of, one way or another. I don’t want whoever clears my estate to have to go through the same thing.

And that beings me back to the old-timey diskette. It occurred to me that many of us may have stuff that’s not old-fashioned china or some other thing we have no personal connection to, but things that are much more modern—though no less personal for us. I certainly have loads of old tech stuff that I think is cool or interesting, plus other stuff that has meaning to me—to me. I don’t want to burden others with having to deal with stuff I alone decided they might want, and I’m quite happy to make that decision for them. If I’m on my final days and still of sound mind, then people can tell me if there’s something they want. But otherwise, whatever I leave behind will be cleared after I die. If I still have that diskette by then, it’ll be included.

In the meantime, and hoping that the final clearing of my house is a very, very long time away, I’ll continue to enjoy the things I know to be useful or believe to be beautiful, as I alone define those notions, and also that I’ll continue to reduce the volume of stuff in my house, as I’ve been doing since ever I moved into this house, though I still have a long way to go. Actually, I suppose my attitude is the ultimate expression of optimism: I’m betting that my lifespan also has a long way to go. This clearing of stuff is, for me, a marathon, not a sprint, and I intend to win the race.

I doubt I’ll find any more old diskettes, though.