Isn’t it amazing how quickly you accumulate “stuff”?
I mean this week marks the two-year point for me and my little family moving to Senatobia. That’s only two years we’ve spent in our little home on Southern Street. But looking back on those two years they seem to be a blur.
Wasn’t it just yesterday we pulled into a town where we didn’t know a soul and unpacked our U-Haul?
But the old saying goes, “The days are long, but the years are short.” Well, you best believe it.
So here we are now, two years later and we are moving again. Now don’t too excited, it’s not to leave town, we’re just taking the next step and moving to a different home.
As with every move, it was time to start going through things and sorting it into the piles to take, store or things we no longer wanted.
Now I have never been what I consider a pack rat. I’ve always maintained a healthy sense of knowing what I didn’t have use for any longer and had no qualms about donating unused items. However, going through all my closets and cabinets, I was amazed at the sheer number of things we’d acquired in the two short years we’ve been here.
Keep in mind, right before we’d moved to Senatobia from Lower Alabama (or LA as the locals call it), we’d done the very same act of purging what we didn’t need.
So how does it happen?
How do we go through life and keep packing things into our homes and closets and cupboards?
I can’t help but think we do the same thing to our inner beings.
We live and go through experiences and as we do, we mentally tuck things into the back of our minds and hearts. As we go on they tend to begin to weigh us down. We aren’t as ready to “move” on to brighter pastures because we didn’t take the time to “sort” things out. Now, I’ll tell you this, I’ve certainly had some experiences in my time here in Senatobia.
While I’ve been in the newspaper business for more than 12 years now, I’d never been a publisher before. This experience has taught me a lot about leading a company.
I’ve learned that at the end of the day, for better or worse things will always be my fault. Sometimes even when they aren’t. I’ve learned to speak out. I’ve learned to be quiet.
I’ve learned that when I make a mistake all I can do is pick up my head and walk forward. I’ve learned to be embarrassed. I’ve learned to have pride. I’ve learned to laugh when all I feel like doing is crying in a corner. I’ve learned it’s okay to cry in a corner as long as you get up, dry your face and start again. I’ve learned that second chances should be extended to everyone because no one is perfect.
And see, that may be the hardest lesson for me personally to learn. Going back as far as I can remember, I’ve always been a perfectionist. As soon as something was no longer perfect, I wanted to flee or get rid of it.
An example is in college I attempted Calculus II three times because anytime I made less than an A, I would drop the class and sign up for the following semester. See I didn’t want my perfect GPA to be tarnished by a difficult class.
I’d somehow managed to make it through life with the notion that if something wasn’t as perfect as I thought it should be, well it wasn’t “good” enough. Well, I’ve finally learned that’s simply not the case.
As I was going through my home this past week, I was mentally going through inner baggage as well. I’m so proud of all the things I’ve learned so far by being here in Senatobia. No, I’m not proud of all of my choices as a newbie publisher, but I’m thankful for the lessons I’ve learned so far. All I can do is “sort out” the things to keep, the things to store for later, and the things to throw away.
I can’t wait for the next two years to unfold as I plan a new adventure of marrying my wonderful fiancé and we buy our first home together. But I’m also excited about the many new things to learn in the newspaper world.
Maybe I’ll just get around to “cleaning” things out a little more often.
