Items I've come across while packing:

Nail Polish: Patriotic Blue, Ruby Red, Bilious Green, Opalescent
1997 was my first year of being single after many years, and the first time that I really noticed the circuit party circuit. Much had changed since the 1980s! I noticed a fad: some of the boys wore nail polish. Sometimes they would be all one color, sometimes different. Sometimes only one or two, like the big toes or a pinky finger.

Hee hee! I was a free man, and how fun, fabulous and decadent! Let me explore my feminine side I giggled. I had a law school friend, R, and with his 21 year old Russian boyfriend, we skipped through the Dollar store exploring our feminine sides and buying out nail polish and face glitter. There may even have been some eyeliner involved, but you didn't hear that from me.

I wore bilious green on my fingers to the 1997 pride festivities. I think we all wore bilious green. And lots of silver rings. I recall one restaurant where gestured a lot, throwing our decorated hands about. After that, I lost interest and forgot about my feminine side. I got a job, the nail polish was packed away and I moved from Denver.

A few years later, I rediscovered it. This time, I wore ruby red on my toes to a summer penthouse party in Denver. I came across the shirt I wore, too: Bright orange, with brown and white psychadelic spots. After the party and a few weeks later, I was out in the back yard talking with my next door neighbor: "What the hell is on your feet!" She exclaimed, "Oh, Hugshyhermit! Go in and take that off!" ho ho ho. (I later sold my house to her and her husband; they sent me a Christmas card -- their son and his wife now live in my old house.)

Torn up Personal Check dated 1994 made out to "Church of Scientology" $5,000 -- for 'e-meter' and 'auditing' services.
Shortly before the date of this check, my sister shocked my family by telling us she had joined the Church of Scientology. It was extremely upsetting, particularly for my parents. My dad and I both uncovered some pretty unsavory stuff. My dad even flew down to Clearwater, the site of their headquarters, to do some research.

I was living with J by that time, in our Logan Street apartment in Denver. I was telling him about some of the findings: About the 'e-meter' -- a contraption that isn't much more sophisticated than two cans at the end of a string and that is supposed to measure whether you're blocked (i.e., lying) or not; and 'auditing' which is psychotherapy by your peers (even though Scientologists are virulently opposed to psychotherapy). When you join their church, auditing and the e-meter can be used to browbeat you into the fold, in the interest of 'clearing' you. I'll save for another blogentry what it clears you of. They charge a pretty penny for it: Evidence suggested the church bleeds you dry for these "services".

J and I started joking around -- "Maybe YOU need to be audited," and "The e-meter says 'all signs say yes'" (like those 'magic' 8-balls). Out came the checkbook. We were laughing so hard, J and I could barely stand; we laughed so hard it brought tears and snot out of our noses.

Box of turn-of-the-century popular music
I think maybe I was in high school and came across these at a yard sale with mom. The stack of sheet music, for piano, had really decorative and cool drawings or designs on the covers. At the time, mom and I were going to use the covers as frameable art, or to decoupage onto a screen or a wall.

After I got settled in Colorado Springs, mom shipped these out to me, still unused. Since I now had an old upright piano, I unpacked a couple of them and, for the first time in years, used some of the music to sight-read. It was amazing how quickly it came back. Not that I was any Liberace. I would read the music for the right-hand melody, then read the music for the left-hand bass, then start to put it together. Some of the old-time chords, chord progressions and melodies have a ragtime feel. Some are sickeningly sentimental love songs "When the Gold has turned to Grey", and "Down by the old school yard". I was really taken aback when I came across a song that was blatantly racist (and I don't mean in an even remotely cute blackface, minstral sort of way, although maybe songs like "Back in Sunny Africa" are supposed to be). Then I came across another -- and another and another. It was unreal how pervasive it must have been. The "n" word was used a lot, "coon", "darky" all of those terms. It's weird to have it paired with a flowery little melody.

'Self-Portrait' 1983, Beginning Photography Class
I came across a photo of me, black & white, that had been part of a class assignment. The mounting has started to disintegrate, the photo is scratched, the edges are bunged.

I sit, straddling a desk chair turned backwards, elbows on the back, frowning. It's taken in a darkly-paneled corner of my room-mate's bedroom in our apartment. I'm looking down, and half my face is in shadows -- I'm frowning. I have helmet hair, a baseball shirt, jeans and socks. I really was surprised by the fact I was frowning. I wonder what I was thinking.

Photography I and II were some of my favorite undergraduate classes. Sometimes I would spend all night developing rolls and rolls of negatives and processing prints, drying in rows and rows of clotheslines inside the darkroom bunkers. (Obsessive even then.) My professor was rumored to be an alcholic, and one time he banged on the door during one of those all-nighters. "Wha th' hell's goin on in there?" he bellowed through the door, continuing to hit the door until I answered. When I opened the door, he stepped back unsteadily, unfocused. He didn't believe me when I said I was working; I picture his leer now. He died a few years ago.

I tend to be a packrat; I didn't throw any of these out. I'm keeping them all, even the nail polish. Especially the nail polish. In two days I move. A new chapter.