Too Many Papers

I've spent days looking for two faxes containing "important documents", which I sent out during the last two weeks. I need them now and will have to resend them along with additional information shortly. It's ridiculous. Because of this intensive hunt for the documents there are now piles of paper all over the floor causing confusion and pressure in my poor little pea brain and a tightness in the stomach every time I look at them. Breathe. How can I look at this differently?

Normally all of these bits have homes in file drawers or storage boxes. Why do I keep them at all? My mother (a bookkeeper, tax preparer for H&R Block, and expert paper pusher) used to say we must keep at least ten years of tax related records (including all receipts) just in case we were ever asked to prove what we claimed. Sufficiently transfused with her concern, like a good girl I still obey this rule. There you have quite a bit of paper already. I can't blame it all on my mommy though. Add to that the fact that I am an artist, writer and pack rat - unable to let go of one single bit of anything that seems as if it might be "useful one day" - photographs, books, booklets, manuals, and scraps of this and that - all related - of course - to projects I may do or to use as inspiration or to remind me of something I want to remember - and there you have it. I live in "a pile of stuff with a cover on it." as George Carlin said.

I recall seeing the writing rooms of famous authors, which were filled from end to end, top to bottom with papers and books and little figures of this or that. There was barely room to move. I am not that bad but almost. It's always been like this with me. Every space I've ever occupied for any length of time soon gets filled with "stuff" - all material, all food as far as I can determine - food I am hoarding to pick over when I get hungry and need to eat something specific in order to continue.

Often when I am done with a project, a sort of postpartum blues settles over me. I begin cleaning, sorting, purging, putting all this 'stuff' into order. As the body moves and the hands handle the outer material, the head brain looks through the eyes and and through the "i's", and through the "I's". It daydreams, imagines, plans. It is sorting. It, is eating what it sees in a sense, it is looking for new projects to work on.

I wonder, where am I? How can I participate more actively in this process? Why do I perform this task in my sleep? I remember to become aware of my breathing and begin to allow my breath to be a part of the picture. More of me comes into focus in the space.

When I find the "important' documents and have safely put them in a new file folder in a safe place, I can make order out of the chaos and move on to the next thing - beginning again.

Peace