William O'Boyle: Beyond the byline: Spring cleaning and a lifetime of memories

Apr. 11—Every year at this time, it happens.

Temperatures rise, rain falls and blossoms appear.

Just look at those blossoms on the trees that line the entrance to where I live — it's a beautiful sight that renews each year.

Simple pleasures, they say.

And with the blossoming of spring, other signs also appear. People are out walking their dogs, riding their bicycles, cleaning their flower beds, spreading mulch and, like me, resuming the purging of their garages, basements and homes.

This has been an ongoing process for me, but I am really making headway, thanks to my friends' recent rental of a large dumpster — for the second time.

So I have taken a couple of carloads of formerly valued items out to their dumpster and rather unceremoniously, tossed them to the wind.

To think that most of these items were once thought to me indispensable have become landfill fodder seems a bit contradictory.

Yet I persist.

I have tossed out, for instance, a grand collection of cassette tapes that were once played repeatedly in my car and home as I sang along to them. These were classics, mind you, albums of the 1960s and 1970s when music was the absolute best — timeless, even.

Also gone is the original basketball used in the "Goons at Noon" pick-up basketball league that we had for more than 20 years at the Kingston Rec Center. The ball is deflated, as are the talents of most of the participants. I stared at that basketball for a few minutes, and I recalled those games where personal fouls where way too personal, defense was pretty much non-existent, and egos were, like the ball, deflated on a daily basis.

I have also discarded a lot of boxes of stuff that I could not even identify. Stuff that was safely stored in my garage for many years.

These are things that I am certain I valued for way too many years with the hope that I would one day find a place or use for most of it. That never happened. So I will continue the process of separating junk from sentimentality and part with many once-cherished mementos of my life.

This has always been a most difficult task for me — especially when much of my childhood and family past was separated from me involuntarily by the Agnes flood of 1972. But none of that sort of stuff will be involved as my Great Garage Purge-Part 2 wraps up.

For instance, I have discarded two hard cover golf travel bags and a couple of pairs of boots that no longer fit.

In fact, once the purge is completed, I may even consider refilling my hot tub to once again relax in and enjoy.

The hot tub is inside my home, on the first floor. I had it installed for daily soaks that revitalized an aging body that endured almost daily games of basketball for several decades. And it worked. I love that hot tub.

What could be better while self-isolating than to be able to take a good soak in my hot tub?

An uncluttered garage. More space in my hot tub room. A million memories off to a landfill, but etched in my memory bank.

And those beautiful blossoms to greet me on may way out and to welcome me home.

Some things can never be purged.