Done

Done.  

The other day I began working on a scrapbook that I had started after I retired in 2009. I had been hesitant to even begin when Brittany was younger because scrapbooking had become such an art, and I was concerned that mine would not measure up. Rather than risk an imperfect scrapbook, I dutifully slipped the photos into a less intimidating photo album. 

When I retired, though, I took on the job of Historian for my local retired teacher's organization, and  became responsible for the scrapbook. Using simple layouts, colored cardstock, and a few stickers I produced a pretty good product that captured the events of the year. 

It was this experience that spurred me on to do the same thing with my family photos. Now at the time I definitely under estimated what this would entail. There was well over twenty years of photos, and my efforts started to quickly become tedious. It's not that I minded the walk down memory lane, it was just such a long road, and I found myself losing interest.  Eventually I just put it up convincing myself that someday soon I would return to it. 

Unfortunately, that day never really arrived, except for a few half-hearted attempts along the way that didn't result in much progress. So now eight years into retirement I'm beginning to realize that as far as this scrapbook goes it's now or never. 

So I drug everything out the other day, and set it up on a card table in the guest bedroom. My heart sunk when I opened up the scrapbook, and realized I had only made it to 1997; a full twenty years ago.  Now I suppose the saving grace of this is that my non-digital photos only go to 2005, so I really don't have to tackle a full twenty years. 

I think along with the sheer number of photos, my reluctance to complete this task has to do with the reality that I very well may be wasting my time. As much as I've enjoyed the blast from the past, I'm not sure my whole family feels the same way. Just like my set of china, I'm afraid these scrapbooks may likely find their way into the trashcan after I'm gone. 

In my efforts to convince myself to carry on I decided that maybe if I listened to some podcasts while I was working I could justify the expenditure of time. This way I could listen to something I enjoyed while recording the history of our family.  I also decided to pick up the pace a little bit, and be less concerned about the perfection of the finished product.

I couldn't help but smile the other day when I came across the words of Elizabeth Gilbert, "I don't want it to be perfect. I want it to be finished. Done is better than good." I'm ready to be done.