Scrapbookers Anonymous

For someone who is a serious conformist, I can be surprisingly nonconventional where technology, trends, and current developments are concerned. All my friends couldn’t wait to turn 16 and start driving; my dad had to threaten me to get me to practice at 17. Everyone in my church singles’ group had a cell phone to stay in touch; I refused to get one and preferred to remain inaccessible. And we all know how I used to feel about blogs.

Scrapbooking fell into the same category. “Everyone is doing it right now” – so I don’t want to. Isn’t it as expensive a habit as drugs? The purpose of preserving memories and photos was commendable, but the complicated designs with millions of stickers and ribbons and stamps were beyond my powers of imagination and skill. Besides, I had my own outlet for creativity as I advised high school students on the newspaper and yearbook staffs. Scrapbooking, pshaw.

I should have recognized that keeping ticket stubs and making sure programs (heaven forbid) don’t get bent was a sign, and lessons learned in the past didn’t mean anything, either: all throughout college and grad school, I maintained when asked that I was NOT going to use my English degree to be a teacher … but I secretly kept adding to a file in my drawer labeled “Teaching Ideas.”

So I’m forced to confess: I have joined the scrapbooking cult. Too many little papers and a LOT of photos were piling up (there must be some undiscovered law of physics that states when one is touring Europe, hundreds of photos will be taken).

For my husband’s sanity, I am striving to deal with my new addiction slowly and not be solely responsible for keeping Michael’s or Joann’s in business. (But what is one to do when the paper is not 59 cents a sheet, but on sale – 4 for $1.00?? It would be stupid not to stock up, of course.) I have finished almost 10 pages of our London honeymoon book, which is about halfway, I figure.

I think I’ll take a break from hunching over the table and go fold the wrinkled laundry….

Then, as a reward, head over to Michael’s to buy a new edge punch. Or two.