Artifacts!

2013-2016ish

My dad is moving to Minnesota and gave me a few boxes of things that belonged to me. I didn’t even have to look inside one of them to start feeling dread loom over me. Here’s the dilemma:

1. I hate throwing things away, and

2. I hate collecting things.

I’m going to keep a record of what I found, but get rid of 99% one way or another. Here’s a few things that I found in the box.

A multi subject notebook (2016)

Containing astrophysics and macro econ homework. I miss college a lot. I miss writing papers and I miss upper division classes. The first two years of college are a total pain, but once you get into classes you’re actually interested in… boy that’s a special time.

I feel like I’ve learned so much about how I work since my ADHD diagnosis, I’d enjoy school so much more and be way less hard on myself than I was then. I always felt like I was behind the curve in the hardest classes for math and physics compared to my classmates, and had to work twice as hard to get the same grade as others.

An Xbox 360 hard drive (probably 2008 or 2010?)

My first video game console was an Xbox 360. I still remember the blades UI and playing Burnout Revenge on it the first day I booted it up. I know that I didn’t have this Xbox through college so not sure how it made it into this box. My parents were very hesitant to let me play video games as a child and so I felt very late to the game in getting my first console in my preteen years. To me now… it feels still quite young to get your own video game console at 10 or 12 years old.

Learn to play guitar book + DVD (only $24.95!)

I have no recollection of this book at all. I’ve wanted to be able to play guitar for a long time. I took a few months of lessons when I was in Berlin and still own an electric guitar, although I haven’t picked it up in forever. Maybe again someday?

My First Book of Japanese Words / Genki I (2014ish)

I started teaching myself Japanese when I was in my freshman year of college. One of my friends, Patrick, had been teaching himself Japanese and wanted to take a trip to Japan with our friend group. To gear up for this trip, I started learning Japanese on my own using these books and Wanikani. I studied for about a year or so and learned a lot about reading and writing Japanese through these sources, but struggled with speaking and listening. My uncle got me My First Book of Japanese Words for my birthday one year. He’s a polyglot and advocated for using kids books as a way to learn a new language.

I’m sure I’ll find some more random kids books and Japanese workbooks in other boxes.

Colored Pencils in a tin case

I can’t quite remember where these came from, but I believe my mom got them for me one Christmas when coloring books were trending among people my age as a stress reliever. I looked inside and it seemed like only the dark green, dark blue, grey, and black colored pencils were used…

Exploring Black Holes (2015)

As a part of my physics minor in school, I took an independent study course with Dr Stamatis Vokos specifically about black holes.

Studying with Dr Vokos (he insisted we call him Stamatis) felt like what school is supposed to be. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to study in some Greek symposium under Aristotle? This is what studying with him felt like (at least, in the higher level classes).

For my intermediate physics class, I studied alongside maybe 10 other students. We regularly met at Stamatis’ house, he’d cook us dinner, and we’d talk about physics concepts for a few hours. It was wintertime so I’d often head home in the dark. There were tests, and there were papers. There was homework occasionally as well. But most of our time spent on this class was in intense discussion - students often talking at length together with Stamatis only stepping in to ask questions and challenge our assumptions.

My independent study course was just like this. He offered me one to two hours with him once a week, with the stipulation that I’d teach him how to use a Python library to draw physics simulations (I never ended up actually doing that). I told him I was interested in learning more about black holes. He responded with a book list that I could pick from as my textbook for the quarter (I chose this one). And each week, we would meet and talk about a chapter together. I would come to him with questions and we’d discuss the concepts of special and general relativity together. I’d assign my own homework, work on the problems, and come to him when I got stuck on anything. It was beyond the perfect setting for me to learn things in depth and at my own pace. Not only that, but it really honed in on the perfect motivator for me: respecting somebody so much that I really wanted to work hard and not let them down. So often in high school I’d find my teachers would not have earned my respect, and they’d lose any possibility of motivating me to get my work done. This is still a strong motivator for me at work - if I care for my teammates and my manager, it’s much easier for me to focus on my work and get shit done.

My final project was a simple study and technical write up of a specific concept, I did mine on spinning black holes! I’m really happy that I published it as a website that I can still look back on here. I don’t really understand much about the math proofs anymore, I wish I did!

“Secret” book (1954)

This is a book about the atomic bomb and how it was used in World War II. My papa (my maternal grandfather) picked this up in 1954, possibly in Korea according to the inside cover. It certainly smells like it’s that old. It feels like there’s unknown and complicated history with this book, considering my papa fought in the Korean War. I acquired it from his attic probably sometime in 2013-2016. Honestly, this book has an unsettling aura to me. I didn’t read through it, but would almost rather not know what the authors write about the US involvement in WWII, the atomic bomb and its usage, and even the story around my papa’s acquisition of this book.

Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain (2014)

I’ve always wanted to be able to draw and paint well. I used to draw a lot of comics as a kid. I haven’t spent time doing it since developing self-consciousness as a preteen. Whenever I see a sunset, or a sky full of clouds, I deeply wish I could paint it. There’s no other medium to capture the sky. Whenever I see a building weary from age or grand architecture that’s worn down over the years, I wish I could sketch it. A picture from a camera could never do those things justice.

Pocket Guide to Technical Communication (2015)

A textbook from a project management / technical design course I took my junior year of college. Taught me nothing at all.

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I’m using these pictures and these words to help memorialize these objects before I get rid of them. It feels like the only respectful thing I can do for these things without having to keep them around. Besides, if I continued to accumulate these objects, how often am I going to sift through them and remember?

What if I’ll miss these things? What if I regret throwing this thing in the trash or giving this other thing to Goodwill? What if there’s something else I could have squeezed out of each of these objects before giving them away?

I’m hoping that these simple pictures and a simple description of my current memory will do the trick. I’ll have to live with the rest of the details to fade into nothing.