Scrapbooks

I save little snippets, tickets and programs, thinking one day I will create a scrapbook of several of the things that I have done in my life. Why do I do this and why do I never get started? These thoughts jumped into my head as I was sorting through the detritus of pill bottles and the paper that comes with them and reloading my weekly pill box.

This could be a scrapbook, I said to myself as I looked at my cardiac logbook/diary from Mercy Health. I brought this book with me to my last follow-up visit with the cardio-thoracic surgery folks and the NP that I saw that day remarked that people rarely bring the book with them to the doctor. It plainly states to bring this log to the post op visits. Do people not read well?

Do I want a scrapbook of my heart attack? This binder collects everything in one spot. BPs, heart rate, exercise (I lied a little), how many times I blew into the lung gizmo and how many times I sucked on the other lung gizmo. A book that I could open a few years hence and reminisce. Do people do that? Do I want to do that?

Jake the exercise guy came today dismiss me from the follow up exercise program that came with my CABG surgery five weeks ago. He asked me to do a few specific exercises to assess my recovery and during that activity I noticed a small book sticking out from behind my IKEA bookcase I bought several years ago. After the exercise I pulled it from behind the shelves and discovered it was a small photo album that I had purchased for Cheryl many years ago. She had placed in it photographs of the grand children. She did this at the beginning of her dementia years to remember who they were as small children. They were pictures that she liked. As her mind deteriorated she added a few other notes and an obituary of some unknown (to me) person carefully trimmed from the newspaper. She had created a sort of scrapbook.

Now that I have discovered it and recovered it from its hiding place, I will return it to the collection of similar items that I separated from the other random assemblies in her office when she went to stay in memory care.

The small booklet and exercise papers and Jake’s dismissal paper and the Mercy Health binder and log that I meticulously kept up and later discovered the material was dated and they needed to update, I put together on a shelf (and called it macaroni like Yankee doodle). Perhaps one day hence I will look through it all and reminisce. But I suspect not.

Like the closet full of old checks and check statements I think that in a few years I will skim over it and recycle it into the nearest trash receptacle. I will be able to look in the bathroom mirror at my scar and reminisce.

The little picture album with random notes will await my return in the tub of family memories.

Carpe Scrapbook Diem.