This is from over 25 years ago in Tallahassee. The space shuttle flies low over the phallus of the State of Florida Capitol, hitching a ride home to Cape Canaveral.
Some call it “spring cleaning”.
I call it “purging”. I kept the card, but I certainly didn’t need printouts of old COBOL code anymore! Or books on tuning Oracle for performance. Or my old SQL training material (although SQL is still relevant – maybe I’ll end up teaching it again?).
And about the COBOL…demand is surprisingly high for this skill as organizations race to bolster staffing and modernize and replace legacy systems before mass baby boomer retirements leave a workforce unable to keep these antiquated systems running. I think of the urgency of replacing old technology as “y2k on steroids” in terms of the work required to prepare for the “silver tsunami” of retirements.
Ugh! This is what I hate about “purging” activities. I get caught up in reflection and flip flop on getting rid of things. And so the whole process takes forever. For one closet.
That’s when I turn to a strategy in “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up” (lots of good stuff in that book): hold each item in your hand. If you feel joy, keep it. If not, get rid of it. It’s simple. And doesn’t require reading. Or analyzing. Just access to feeling.
And that’s why I kept this ID card.