I was busy in the office for a while today, sorting out teaching notes to have made into pdfs (rather than taking stacks of paper notes with me), and I had some extra time before I could do go to the rec center to turn back the kayak I rented the other day. So I started sorting through some of my course and grade files.
There's no reason I need grade files from during my grad school times, right? I thought not. Nor from my previous job? Recycle! (I do go through and pull off paperclips, because it's not that bad and then we don't have to buy as many new ones.)
And committee meeting stuff! I got rid of tons of that from previous years. (The official meeting notes are always available on line, and more reliable than anything I would have written.)
It felt amazingly liberating and good. I think I got rid of a good foot of files.
It actually felt like I accomplished something, even though it wasn't something that had to be done before I left. (I also accomplished some of those things, too.)
I love getting rid of paper. Or just getting rid of stuff in general. Liberating is exactly the right word for it.
ReplyDeleteI've been doing this too. Some of the stuff is so dusty I get hives!
ReplyDeleteI'm in the process of throwing away mounds of old papers I've been saving in my basement--all papers from when I taught high school 10 years ago. A liberating experience, indeed!
ReplyDeleteDitto! We've been overhauling our entire office suite and some of the things we've found have included printouts of every damn email ever sent or received by the people in there 10 years ago. Feels wonderful to toss it all.
ReplyDeleteHave fun!
I have six tubs of such papers sitting next to the couch right now (we pulled them out of the basement last week). Ugh.
ReplyDeleteHaven't been able to work up the energy to tackle them but reading this made me want to feel like you did. So. You have inspired me, thank you!
when i left my old office, i dumped 8 large recycling bins worth of duplicates and junk. very liberating. every so often i go on a reycling binge at the home office, but not often enough.
ReplyDeleteI love doing that. The problem is my institution told me I have to hold on to everything (papers, grades, etc) for three years before getting rid of it, so it's piling up dust!!!
ReplyDelete