Looking back, I find that there isn’t one moment where my decision hinged. Like usual, it was a series of decisions that have brought me where I am today. Today, I think of yesterday, or the ghost of many yesterdays, that have been tucked away in the closet of my mind.

“Hi, Dad! Karen and I are going out.”

“Ok, just clean your room first.”

The dreaded phrase. Just once I had hoped he would forget it. Just once.

The problem isn’t so much that I had to do it; the problem was that I had to do it and be in before the midwestern October sun went down. I had to be in at dark and the gap between 3:30 daylight and 5:00 dark left me with precious time to keep. Each moment spent cleaning was a minute more that saw the horizon line ascending.

“Ok dad…”

Now, mind you, my room wasn’t very big, but a twelve-year-old girl has lots of stuff, and I was a girl with many interests – one of them was NOT putting things back where they belonged.

I had lots and lots of clothes that took many changes to be gotten right in the morning before school. There were clothes and games, and record albums, makeup, stuffed animals, and Barbies, baby dolls and hair bobbles everywhere – everyday.

These in-between years saw stuffs increase as I couldn’t let go of childhood things and was sticking my toes into teen concerns.

It was an exciting time, but with so many interests, and so little room, there was also (as mentioned) so little organization. Yep, I had a messy youth. So, each day, my dad’s chant would ring in my ear.

You think I’d learn.

Well, I had learned. I learned that all I had to do was get the stuff out of sight because my dad didn’t really check, he just glanced in – and he probably didn’t know really how unkempt it was to begin with. So, shoving shorts and shirts, shoes and skirts, teddy bears and Tetris, baby dolls and barbie dolls, (sometimes even an errant pillow), nothing was sacred – all went unceremoniously in the closet.

Oh, the closet was my friend.

That gaping mouth, waiting for its daily feed; progressively filling up. You might have heard a burp if the poor closet hadn’t kept getting more fed into it and its digestive capabilities never consumed. Things went in, and sat.

This daily ritual was joined by a quarterly ritual – the clean out. As the season changed, my need for things changed and I would have to take all the stuff out and organize it. I didn’t mind this ritual. It was like going on a free thrift store hunt. Oh, look at this, I forgot I had that! So, it would be brought back to life, until another feeding session.

As I got older, the back of closet started collecting things outgrown, and the daily feeding diminished. Maturity paid the cost for knowing where to find things, but the back of the closet collected those items where sentiment stole its disposability, so they became closet residents. There they remained. Even after I left home and moved out, they stayed in the dusty spaces of the closet and my mind.

I suppose I thought the closet would never change. It would always be there waiting, with my childhood friends patiently standing (or sitting) in repose, ready for another season to be brought out into the light.

But just as I carelessly shoved them deep into the closet’s bowels, those unattached to my dusty memories carelessly shoved them in the trash bin.

Lost to me, but residing in my mind, regretting one little decision that cannot be redone.