TREASURED TRASH

Several years ago I was doing a little tidy-up in our shared closet. Making sure I don't miss a single piece of trash, I was opening boxes that looked suspiciously candidates for the waste bin. I stumbled upon this little tin coin box in the shape of the Filipino jeep which can be opened on its roof. Suspicious, I thought. With gnashing teeth I struggled to open that tin box. At one sudden pull, the contents burst out and holy smokes! Scattered around me were little candy wrappers from God-knows-when. I shrieked to call my sister.

In general, we are beings of sentiments, and we love to keep things that remind us of these treasured feelings no matter how small, stupid, or plainly pointless. "Remembrance," as we fondly call them. When we were in, say high school, we used to love keeping this scrapbook that contains the weirdest memorabilia that it makes it hard to store the scrapbook itself. Empty wrappers, receipts, tissue papers, band-aids, boxes --- name it. And when we look back and go over this 'collection' from time to time, we take ourselves back to the very feeling we felt when we acquired them. And even if the memory hurts, it still ironically makes you smile. It's the ultimate concrete manifestation of our sentimiento de asukal. These may just be simple things, but they symbolize a greater part of our culture.

I myself am keeping boxes of letters that were given to me over time, from the formal Palanca to the crappiest little note where someone wrote me "Hoy!" on a post-it and just signed her name on it. Besides my fixation with written words, it just goes to prove I'm also a keepsake keeper. I totally see nothing wrong with this custom, except that I occasionally feel guilty for it occupies a significant amount of space in my life, both physically and emotionally. Nothing wrong in looking back on them, but sometimes, it's the process of looking back that stagnates us and holds us back in our decision to look forward to the hopes of the future. 

Maybe we should try a little letting go sometimes. It's hard, but the moment we stop keeping physical things to remind us of our sentiments, it's when we recognize that what's important is how these experiences changed us. And there's no need to keep physical evidences of such because we ourselves are already symbols of sentimiento de asukal accumulated over time. #

photo credit: behance