While working on my compilation for my items I am often asked why I do what I do. Why do I collect items from my youth, and before me? What do I need them for? Here is my explanation. I know I am preaching to the choir on this one.
I am a history teacher (among other things) and I am worried. Our modern 21st century society, and even this website is not a timeless medium. We know so much about the ancient cultures, past societies, and history because of the recorded information being placed on items that, for the most part have stood the test of time. Our descendants and theirs and so on, will not have the evidence of our civilizations/ society to the extent that we have the items from our predecessors. I still send postcards, write letters, read hard copies of books, and print photographs from film. These all will cease to exist in our paperless, online web based society. I know it is ironic that I am stating this here, on a web site; but it is the idea that through this medium I can share some of these items that have been markers of our time , what we have been through and seen, and those who came before us. Think of all the items the millions of people passing through have purchased. Where are they now?
Think of our children sorting through our belongings when we move along to our big SDC in the sky. They will come across photos, letters, books, tangible items that will be too cumbersome for them, and like many others discard them. Why keep this if I have it digitally? Why hold onto the larger, the slower, or the not so new? Buy the smaller, quicker, the newer. Condense.
I keep my items not because I am a pack rat or a hoarder, but because I can feel connected, and bonded with my past, and have the memories rush back to me. Connections that I, being raised in a time when technology was many years away, cannot feel with e-readers, and text messages. How would our lives be if we did not have these things? Ask a kid to use a map instead of an app, or dial a phone that has no send button or a cord (or better yet a rotary), ask them to use a dictionary instead of spell check, Or spend hours at the library until closing time to try to research for the term paper you had to type on a typewriter, or basic word processor. They make life easier, but at what cost. Are we becoming too lazy, and fostering the immediate gratification of everything? What happened to waiting for your photos on 35mm, never knowing if the show you missed would be on re-runs, having to find the right track before you dropped the needle.
Books have been replaced by tablets
Postcards by text messages
Photographs with Jpegs/ Images
My collection is a testament to what will eventually disappear from our lives, and an example of one persons small contribution to a passion that many have. I will compile the things of mine into a comprehensive piece so I can make my small difference. I keep so I can spread the knowledge, I keep because I cannot see these lost to time, I keep so I will not forget.
