Office Time Capsule

Russ and I moved to our house July 3, 1994. We waited five days for our moving truck to show up. It was four days late and made me very nervous since everything we owned was in that truck. While we waited we went to Home Depot and found a dhuri rug that looked like a quilt pattern. We put it in my office. I needed a desk since I worked from home when I wasn’t on the road at clients.

The desk we ended up getting was a giant semi-circle with two long straight extensions on each side and three rolling file cabinets that sat underneath. It was a behemoth. I sprang for a red Herman miller chair and turned my office into a command center of commerce.

Those file cabinet drawers quickly filled up with all the tools I needed for work and eventually any important family items, like spare keys, insurance policies and every one of Carter’s report cards.

At one point I wanted a walking desk and the room would not accommodate the command center and a treadmill desk. By then I was only an editor at Durham Magazine, not an important business person. So Russ and I dismantled the behemoth. I moved one of the side extensions to the wall along with all three rolling file cabinets. The semi-circle went to rabbit room, previously the nursery, now Russ’ home office and the other side extension went downtown to Russ’ corporate office.

The file cabinets, with their three drawers each, remained largely untouched, save the occasional opening to find a large binder clip or a Benjamin Moore paint chip displaying the color we painted the guest room 24 years ago.

Today I decided was the day to start tackling what was inside those rolling drawers. There are six small drawers and three hanging file drawers. I knew I could not do it all at once so I started with three of the small drawers that were filled up with office supplies and miscellaneous items.

I found seven different business cards, three from Durham Magzine because we moved offices often, two from the Food Bank, one from my needlepoint group, and one was personal. There must have been a dozen or more bottles or small containers of pain killers, all at least twenty years old or older. (I think my work life was more stressful back then.)

There were the normal office things, like paper clips and rubber bands that had practically turned to dust and lost their snap. I had six manual pencil sharpeners despite the fact that I have an electric pencil sharpener on top of my desk. There were more used lipsticks, nail files and dental floss that needed to be in my bath room not my desk. And all off this was in one drawer.

The drawer below it was a time capsule of electronics of the 90’s. There were four different tiny film cameras, along with a dozen unused film cartridges. Some weird video camera, my sharp Zarus, which was like a tiny computer, calendar, address book and all things important when I worked in the UK. If I change the batteries I might be able to look at it.

I found at least 75 old credit and membership cards, four from airlines that have long been out of business. Oh, how I miss Midway airlines. There was a checkbook from an account Carter’s name and mine as the trustee from Nations Bank. I don’t even remember Nationa bank, let alone why Carter needed a checking account as a baby. (Sorry Carter I don’t know what money was in that account.)

I did a good job throwing away most everything that was unimportant. I did come across a handful Reporter notebooks from my time working at Durham’s Magazine. I tried not to spend time reading those notebooks, but I did find Jay Bilas’ business card from an event I covered with Coach K. It all went in the trash.

Three drawers was all I could handle today. Tomorrow I will try again on some others. I am dreading the files as I am certain to get bogged down reading things I have not seen in two decades. Throwing away old altoids and white out is easy. Finding letters written to me from people no longer living is going to be harder.