Organizing paperwork today and, in the spirit of ecology was using old file folders. Grabbing the white out strips to cover up the writing on old folders gave me pause for reflection and contemplation.
The majority of folders were used when George
and I had our own business, Heritage Printers.
Back in 2003, fearing a layoff looming on his horizon, George met some
people from Press-A-Print. Press-A-Print
offered sales and training for equipment to do an in-home business for
promotional products. You know, the
chachki’s used to spread your business name around to get people to buy your
products. Intrigued, and a creative
designer by trade, George expressed interest in doing this side business. He figured in the event he got laid off this
would be a great way to supplement unemployment.
The first thing we had to do was come up with a
business name. After some back and forth
we decided upon Heritage Printers. The background
of that name was that Benjamin Franklin invented the printing press and since
we were going to do printing (though of a different nature), it was in our U.S.
Heritage. He even designed a logo that
incorporated Benjamin Franklin into it.
We set up shop at our home and business trickled
in. About two or three years in we had
managed to get a number of jobs. And the
folders I encountered today included some of those business names. As I spread white out across the folders I
remembered some of the jobs we had done for these business. Lot of business cards. Probably our biggest job and a repeat job was
for Cal State Stanislaus where the daughter of one of our friends was a key
contact. I remembered some of the crazy
things they had us make from throw blankets to beach balls, glow sticks and
tshirts.
George never did get laid off which left doing
most of the business ventures to me. I
was not as confident about doing the actual pad printing on my own as the
science behind it and the fear of making a mistake loomed large. With George working full time we eventually
did what many people in our situation did, we ordered wholesale. Less work and a whole lot more fun!
Today’s names that came up were some of the
women’s businesses in the group I had joined, churches we did work for,
strangers wanting something for an event.
Each white out erased the name of a company or a person for whom we had
made connections.
We closed that business in 2012 as the .com industry
had suffered and not many people had budgets for the products. By the time we were done, we were pretty much
doing mostly business cards which was not a money maker at all.
Though sad in some respects, I was also relieved
to not have this business anymore. Here
it is, some eight years later, and I am just now re-using folders from that
business. (It didn’t help that George
insisted we keep the files but which I think I finally got rid of or just kept
some very basic things in case of taxes.)
Our brains are much the same. We have information in file folders in our
memory. For a time we can retrieve much
of what is stored there. As time goes
on, the need to retain so much information goes away. In some cases it is a sign of aging. For me, my memory has never been that great
anyway. However, sometimes a word, a
name, a place will flit across that memory bank and I can see and hear people,
conversations and places as if it were just yesterday.
I love these sorts of memories, bittersweet
though some may be. They tell a story,
MY story. Each name that I remember is
an intrinsic part of me, whether or not I remember the details. I can choose to open the file or leave it
tucked away. It will always be
there.
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