IS THERE A CURATOR IN THE HOUSE?

It was a rainy day in Dayton on Sunday. Ken left on an early flight to attend a conference in Austin. Riley curled up on the couch and didn’t even raise his head when I suggested a walk. I held up his leash. He just blinked at me and tucked his nose under his tail. So, fine. I did my weekly online Weight Watchers weigh-in, made some tea and a tomato/egg scramble and then served it to myself on cracked oat toast. I tallied up my breakfast points, checked out what was posted on Facebook, did the crossword, poured a second cup of tea which meant I wouldn’t be venturing too far from home any time soon if you get my drift, watched a two-hour Masterpiece Classic I had recorded a couple of weeks ago, and finally by 11:00 I thought I should get out of the jammies, get dressed and do something productive.

That uncharacteristic spark of energy led to cleaning out the closet in the bedroom that we refer to as our home office, aka, the Museum of Junk.

Among the assorted artifacts I unearthed that I hadn’t seen in the three years since we moved into the house were the following:

One bin of computer cords and various demo CDs, the purposes for which I have no idea because the computer, printer and all other electronics seem to be operating just fine without them.

Seven mismatched toss cushions that no longer participate in our home décor.

Three logo-emblazoned conference tote bags with matching aluminum travel mugs.

Four old, non-digital cameras and a disabled tripod with only two working legs.

One gallon-sized baggie filled with pens; none of which work.

Five manufacturer’s boxes for electronics that we no longer own.

One bag of Canadian ephemera – i.e., a bunch of plastic items imprinted with the maple leaf.

One floor mop.

One file folder of photos, cartoons and memos that used to be pinned to my office divider at my job in Buffalo.

Seriously. Why do we keep this stuff? No, I mean really. It’s an interesting question. As someone with museum experience, this is fascinating to me. Imagine historians of the future examining the relics of our age. They might assess today’s trash as harboring momentous social and cultural implications. Those articles from the closet could turn out to be treasures, clearly. Stuff with impressive provenance. Creditable objects worthy of interpretation and preservation. Slap a label on them and call them exhibits!

Maybe you’ve got some of this stuff in your house. You too could curate your own home museum exhibitions. Here’s how to bring out your latent amateur historian. We’ll use the floor mop as our example. First, we’ll examine its history and relevance to life today and develop a premise or theory. Next, we’ll craft some exhibit text that might go something like this:

                MOP, string type, with Miracle Microfiber, circa 2009:

First invented in 1496, the domestic cleaning appliances known as “mops” have been used over the centuries to dry-dust floor areas or, when used with buckets of hot water and soapy solutions they assist with the wet washing of such floor marks as dirty paw prints. Mops manufactured in the early part of the 21^st century used microfiber technology to magnetize dust particles and cling to them forever. This mop is in remarkable condition having only been used once to attract dog hair and so-called “dust bunnies” under a bedroom dresser but which failed in its duty to release the dirt when shaken outdoors causing its owner to determine that it was really only moving filth from one location to another and thus abandoned it at the back of a closet.

See? You can all kinds of fun as a junior curator!

I de-accessioned the boxes to the recycle bins, decided that a Goodwill Gallery was the best place for the toss cushions and threw out the pens. But the rest of this stuff – hey, maybe there’s reason to think it might have merit!

So, now, the issue is, how do we display our artifacts? Or should we return them to the archives? Here is where the truly great custodians of chatchkes really shine. When the going gets tough, the curator gets storage containers. (And I’ve done them all. I was doing decorative bins before Martha Stewart even got her first glue gun.)

My latest breakthrough in storage containment concepts are 8 ½” x 11” clear, plastic file folders with closeable flaps. These babies are ideal for magazine clippings, photos, maps, trip brochures — you name it. What we’d call in the museum biz, “visible storage.”

So, now that I have all that junk catalogued and put away for all eternity, I’m feeling a curatorial frenzy coming on. I might take on some spaces in the basement, like the Subterranean Slide Show Storage Facility, the Cardboard Box Boneyard, and the Not-Ironed-Yet Hall of Fame.  Maybe I should charge admission.