Firsts

So many firsts in life, first step, first smile, first pair of shoes, first car. I am a sentimental saver. If something means a lot to me, I like to keep it. After watching episodes of hoarders on A&E however, I also love to get rid of everything without immediate value. The amazing amount of stuff some of those people keep in their homes and yards drives me to want to remove unneeded items from my house as much as possible.

Today, for my FIRST blog entry, I will be throwing away an item I should have gotten rid of long ago. The summer between 7th and 8th grade my sister and I took a trip to lake Tahoe with a friend. Her mother was on a business trip and we spent the days playing miniature golf and swimming in the amazingly blue lake. If you've never been up there you should check it out, the water is so clean you can see the bottom of the lake almost into the middle. On this trip, I crossed the California state line for the first time in my life (sheltered I know), and bought my very first pair of earrings. My mom would not allow me to get my ears pierced, at least until I was 14, but she was easily convinced to reduce that to 12, when children want something they learn how to get into their parents' heads. Her only condition was that she would do the piercing, because the guns were not reliable.

My first pair of earrings were small pink dangling earrings, with pink jewels. I lost one of them about two years ago and keep expecting the other one to show up. Like the left sock you always lose in the dryer, the right earring is lost in another world. Maybe "AAh Real Monsters" will do an episode on that, I remember they did one on missing socks. As a sentimental saver I have kept this earring for too long, and now, thanks to my goal to get rid of one item a day, I will begin with something I have been saving.