My Hoarder Potential

I have trouble throwing things away.

I’m not a hoarder or anything, I’ve got a wife who makes sure things don’t get out of control, but I won’t throw things away voluntarily. Through wisdom gained with age I’ve been able to narrow it all down to a small handful of reasons. One of those reasons was the catalyst for what you are reading now. But in true Chris fashion, it’ll take me a bit to get there.

You want the foster care reason first, I get that. So here it is.

I came to care with only what I was wearing and my Walkman. No sob story, just the way it went. I’d get some of my things later but none of the things that were important to me. My books? Gone. My trophies? Gone. My pictures? Gone. Merit badges, shirts from the free community camps the town I lived in would throw each summer, mementos and all other traces of my life before care were gone. Just gone.

They say that foster kids are resilient. From what I know, resiliency isn’t a choice, it’s a necessity.

I didn’t want to get over all my stuff evaporating, I had to. Didn’t want to move in with a strange family, had to. Didn’t want to change schools, had to. Didn’t want to make new friends, had to. I didn’t want any of the changes I had to experience, but that’s the hand I was dealt. That’s the hand most of these kids are dealt.

I could have swum against the current. I could have screamed and broke as many household items as I could get my hands on. Could have gotten myself tossed out of school. Could have fought. Could have caused a ruckus, I’m an excellent ruckus causer. But I fell in line. I read the room and made my play. I guessed right.

Foster care wasn’t as tough on me as it is or was for most kids who came through the system. I attribute a lot of that to the decisions I made. I don’t think I would have had as easy a time with everything, had I not decided early to just roll with it.

I’ve seen dozens of angry kids come through that door in my foster parents’ house. They all came in very similarly to the way I did. They were all similarly as angry as I was. Here’s where they tripped up; they showed the anger. Rookie mistake.

I come from an aggressively poor area. Economically, there isn’t much to talk about. The whole area was covered in coal mines at one point, by the time I was aware of my surroundings, they had all been closed for decades. They were my playgrounds.  It’s what you did when I was coming up.

Where I’m from you basically had three choices; play football, be a badass or get the hell out. I did all three.

You play football to fit in. It’s the town’s religion. As you go to church every Sunday morning without fail, we can be found under the lights every Friday night practicing our religion. It’s what we did.

There came a point where I realized I wasn’t big enough, arm wasn’t strong enough, legs didn’t move fast enough. Maybe it pissed me off. Maybe it made me feel rejected. I imagine both are true, but at the time I just knew I was as content playing football as I was wandering the town with my headphones on.

Here’s the thing about headphones in the 90’s. They carried a stigma. Just like care, if you had headphones on, you were taken as an outcast. Not sure why that was, maybe in the time before Facebook and cell phones people were expected to speak to one another? I suppose those headphones closed me off from the rest of the world….I think that was the point.

I’m a chameleon by nature; I’ve got no trouble fitting in, changing form. Have a favorite hair color? I’ve dyed my hair that color. I’ve run the personality spectrum; from jock to goth, emo to b-boy, I’ve been them all. It took me a really long time to settle into who I am today. That skill was there well before care, but care definitely honed my skills.

Moreover, that skill, the ability to fit the room, that skill helped me all the way through care and had its’ highlights when I aged out. Not everyone wants or has this particular skill; some folks are content in their ways. For a kid in care however, being stubborn can be a handicap.

I think I somehow knew I was never going back home. Not sure how I knew but I just knew. Because of that, I didn’t fight back. As mad as I was, I had the good sense to throw my old life away. Holding on wasn’t going to get me anywhere. It took me a long time to let go. I hate throwing things away but the reality of my situation was; that wasn’t MY life anymore. It was gone.

I wouldn’t say it’s a mistake that kids in care make, to each his own, but if you know you aren’t going home, why hold on to a life that isn’t yours anymore? But no one wants to give up the hope that their life that they knew is gone. It’s good to have hope, it’s a scary thing to have dreams that can’t come true.

There’s a review of Annie in this issue. If you don’t know, Annie was a hit film in the 80’s. The tale of an orphan girl who stays positive and finds an adoptive parent in a millionaire. What a bunch of horseshit!

I have a real problem with films that give foster kids the idea that somewhere a millionaire is just waiting to save them. It’s dangerous and irresponsible.

Addison Cooper of Adoption at the Movies is a fine movie critic. I’ve utilized his work a lot in the past. I’ve only ever said no to him once; Gimme Shelter. Gimme Shelter was a Vanessa Hudgens vehicle in 2013 about a pregnant foster girl who runs away to find her real dad, who conveniently turns out to be a big time broker. Lucky, huh?

Though that film was loosely based on a true story, it’s a one in a million shot. How dangerous for a lost kid in care; believe that there is a millionaire out there waiting on you.

I know what you’re thinking; what about Blind Side? Well, with hard work, any kid with athletic ability can go pro. There are a dozen examples on the mag’s website. How many kids on the famous alumni list found out they had millionaire bloodlines? Zero.

So I have a problem with Annie. That’s my cross to bear. Addison did a great review and you deserve to read it despite my problems with the film, but Gimme Shelter? That was too much. Annie is a fairy tale. The music throughout the film is the indicator that it knows what it is as a film.

But let’s loop back to my inability to let things go or throw away books, magazines, mementos.

Before care I spent a lot of time at my Stepfather’s mother’s house. Grammy was awesome. She had a touch of the hoarder too. Stacks and I mean STACKS of magazines filled her guest room. People, Reader’s Digest, Time etc., she had them all. I would spend hours in that room. Reading, learning, picking up useless facts about people and places I would never meet or see. It was intoxicating.

Every now and again she would let me take a stack or two home with me to read in my room, I had the attic, plenty of space to collect things. I was there when she moved out of her house and into an apartment. I remember sneaking stacks of magazines intended for the dumpster into my room that night. I couldn’t let them go. I had read most of them but they belonged to her, didn’t seem right to throw them away.

I never got to go back to my room when I left for care. In my mind, someone had to go throw away and remove the dozens of stacks of magazines, the pyramids of books, the dusty piles of newspapers and the tapestry of posters and headlines that filled every wall of that space. (I was grounded…A LOT.)

Nowadays, my wife can see it coming. A pile gets a little tipsy. Walking room disappears. New bookcases are needed. She sniffs it out and puts an end to it. She knows I won’t. I can’t.

I also hate when shows on TV end but that’s a rant for another day.

If you have any old magazines, send them to me. Just don’t tell my wife!

Hopefully, this is an issue you won’t want to throw away. It’s a great one. Great stories.

See you next month!