I was born in the year of the Pack Rat

Next week, work is scheduled to begin on our kitchen, which is getting a well deserved, long overdue facelift. As much as I'm looking forward to the end result of said project, I've been dreading its impending arrival. It goes without saying that I'm not looking forward to the inconvenience of being without a kitchen for several weeks, of course, but what I've really been dreading is the terrible hassle of emptying out my current kitchen so that the work can begin.

I've been taking the task a bit at a time (OK, this is bullshit -- I've saved it all for the last minute -- but it sounded so much better that way). Today, I finally started to tackle my kitchen junk drawer, which I had not cleaned out in a while. It had frankly not occurred to me that one should regularly clean out a junk drawer; I mean, why bother to clean out a drawer whose express purpose is to stash junk? I can now answer that question. Today, underneath the scotch tape and emergency kids' birthday cards, I unearthed, among other things:

- Approximately 27 pens (none of which I have ever been able to find when I needed a writing instrument)

- The equivalent of seven boxes of bandaids, all floating freely in the drawer (ditto above)

- Every choking hazard I have ever yanked from a party favor bag before my children could notice

- The cigars someone gave my nonsmoking husband when Julia was born

- Christmas cards from people I do not even remember, plus several I never finished addressing to send out myself

- A to do list from my wedding 6 years ago (including a note that I must check out hyacinth -- never did, obviously because that note was lost in the drawer)

- My 5th grade class picture (yes, mine. 22 years ago. I am at a loss to explain.)

- Several dollars worth of change

- 5 unflattering pair of sunglasses

- Nearly a dozen batteries, apparently dead

- Cat nip (a LOT of cat nip, which, for the record, really smells when you leave it in a drawer for a few years)

- 35mm film (what's that?)

- A watch which I last used to time contractions during my first labor

- Assorted buttons that I fully intend to sew back on their original garments as soon as I can figure out where they came from

- Quite a few foil packed free samples

At the bottom of it all was a thin layer of green powder. I dare not speculate as to its original origin.

I'm sure that my new cherry cabinets will be beautiful, the new granite countertops divine. But what I'm really looking forward to the most is having clean, organized drawers and cabinets. The irony that I could have had these things for free does not escape me. But they'll look so much nicer accented by cherry and granite, don't you think?