Adventures of the Amateur Archivist, Episode 3

Jake is off somewhere in Connecticut for the day, doing an insane bike ride. To pass the time during Lucy's nap, I'm here scanning stuff from the archive and filling up the recycling bin with the detritus of my kindergarden through eighth grade years.

I am about to trash in its entirety my "eighth grade journal." This is NOT the eighth grade journal full of dark poetry; rather, this is the journal that my 8th grade teacher required that we keep and actually read. So I think "journal" isn't quite the right word for it. It's filled with entries about what I was reading and what was going on at school and such. What I find amazing about this is that my teacher responded to EVERY entry in there. No matter how stupid it was. I cannot imagine the time it took for her to read all of this -- and not just mine, but everyone in my class! As I read it now, I am mostly embarrassed; I am seriously obsessively focused on every quiz, test, and report, and constantly worried about my grades. There's also an entry revealing my excitement about the haunted house I'm constructing in the attic of our house, and my excitement that I got a gift certificate to the local office supply store (woo hoo! markers!). Other than that, I worry about band (yes, I was in the marching band), talk about my science fair project. On the latter, I am upset because I did well enough in the first one to go on to the next level and "it's going to be a lot of work to collect more rain." Priceless. (the project was on acid rain.)

Anyway, the only page that was really worth scanning was the drawing my Japanese friend, Kimiko made, shown here:

Check out our over-sized 80s shirts. And hair. Nice. I haven't seen most of these people in many years; I wonder where they are now and what they would think if they stumbled upon this.

I know you're all wondering how I can stand the excitement of spending my Saturday sifting through my archives. The real excitement is tomorrow: we're going to see They Might Be Giants! I'm very excited. This will be Lucy's second time....wait, actually, this will be everyone's second time seeing them. As I type this, I am also listening to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me (fairly typical Saturday activity) and the guests are....the guys from TMBG. They are doing the "Not My Job" quiz, which involves them answering questions about something outside their area of expertise. So since they are "They Might Be Giants," they are being asked questions about Andre the Giant. Brilliant.

So that's today's update. We'll try to get pix of Lucy at the show, but it will be hard to beat this one from the last time.

Adventures of the Amateur Archivist, Episode 2

Yes, readers, dreams really do come true. I wrote this poem in my sixth grade English class. Amongst the archives, I found an impressively bound and illustrated poetry collection (a required element of the course) featuring numerous different types of (required) poems based on various models. This was the "I dreamed..." model.

Also note, I had much better handwriting then. Further evidence regarding dreams and wishes coming true:

Hmmm. That worked out pretty well for me. That appears to be from first or second grade and was in a journal of "I wish..." statements. The next one kinda undercuts my wish fulfillment abilities:

Sorry, Brendan. I was kind of a jerk. Glad the archives could remind us all of that.

Adventures of the Amateur Archivist

We just returned from a visit to see my mom and my brother's family. We had a lovely time. While in Carlisle, I did a bit of excavating in a few boxes in the attic. I was simultaneously horrified and delighted to see the absurd things of mine that had been saved (by both my Mom and by me). We're talking serious documentation. Impressive stuff. Seeing as I don't believe anyone will be writing my biography and needing to visit the Bridget archives, I decided to embark on a serious weeding project.

First, there were boxes of my projects. Years and years of projects, from my early drawings and stories (from first grade) to my forays into various media such as macrame:
(Jake was particularly horrified by the hideousness of this craft)

and cross stitch:
Sadly, other than this digital image, the world will no longer have the physical evidence of my needlepoint abilities. And yes, that is a 4-H project sampler.

So saving my own project is one thing, but I also saved all kinds of other things. If you've ever sent me a letter, I probably still have it. I have a hard time getting rid of such things. In some cases, I have saved the envelops, too. In the eighth grade, I was good friends with a Japanese exchange student who was in my class. She was a most excellent artist, and was always drawing little caricatures of our classmates and teachers. I saved a whole bunch of stuff she drew. Here is a sample:


Yes, she has spelled my name a bit incorrectly. I have chosen this particular artifact to share because it depicts me (in a remarkably flattering and sympathetic manner) sporting my tragic haircut of the eighth grade. Many of you have heard the story of this dreadful, life-altering haircut, and a few of you have seen photos. Even fewer of you saw the actual offending haircut in person (I weep for you). Someday I will tell the sad tale of my haircut (spoiler alert: it involved a perm) and dig up some photographic evidence. For now, this will have to entice to you further reading of my "adventures of an amateur archivist" posts.

So anyway, I thought my saving of envelops and other random -- it has to be said -- crap was a bit, uh, excessive. I felt better when, among my stockpiles, I found these envelops with my mother's handwriting:

That would be two envelops. The larger one says "First Birthday Cards," and was in fact filled with cards that say "You're 1!" Obviously, I am not the one responsible for saving these. But it was fun to see them. In fact, I found a card from my Uncle Hot Dogs. I knew I had a relative who went by the name "Hot Dogs" (he was my great-grandmother's brother) but I somehow didn't realize that he was still around when I was born. Anyway, he wrote something nice in the card and taped a silver dollar into it. Sweet! So that was kind of a fun find. But more amazing is the smaller envelop. In case you can't quite make out what it says, here is the transcription: "Icing off my first Birthday cake." Seriously? Seriously. Inside was a small candle and a very crusty piece of cake decoration. Wow. After formally documenting them for this blog (archive edition), I properly disposed of the icing. Thanks, Mom, for keeping every artifact intact!

Stay tuned for further fun and/or horrifying revelations from the archive.

We heart Freecycle

We really like Freecycle, a place where we go to get rid of stuff that's still useful, and where we sometimes find useful things for ourselves (like Carter's kennel!). Today, while browsing, I noticed this great ad, from Freecycle:

Wanted A Very Large Bird Cage For A Very Large Bird

Seems like a start to a great story.

Arguments with Lucy

I felt the need to document this "conversation" as it presents a first (you'll see which one). I was getting her a bowl of cereal for breakfast this morning, when I hear her yell from her highchair:

Lucy: I don't want that bowl!
Me: OK, you can have this bowl instead.
Lucy: I want two bowls!
Me: Nope. You get one bowl. Which one would you like?
Lucy: I want two bowls!
Me: Nope. You only need one bowl for your cereal. Which one would like?
Lucy: I want two!
Me: One.
Lucy: Sometimes, I have two bowls. Daddy gives me two bowls.

Yes indeed, this is our first "but [other parent] said I could/lets me do this" rebuttal. Awesome.