half past nomad

I have had my Yahoo! ID for almost a decade now. In this past decade, I have filtered and re-filtered hundreds of emails. A massive 6Mb of space made me a king in the 90’s. But I had to decide what stayed and what didn’t in my Yahoo! Inbox. I have kept in that account emails that haunt, emails that make me cringe, emails that make me proud, emails that make me bow to Allah swt.

A few days ago, I made my first furniture purchase of this century. A study desk and a leather chair. It felt odd, to finally tie myself down materialistically. It had to be done, though I’m sure I could have postponed it all till we got a baby crib. Even then, that wouldn’t be mine exactly. It would be for the child. Not me. I’m mobile. I got no baggage. I am swift. I am nomad.

So it was a shocking contrast that earlier this week, all of my archived email was gone. Yahoo! apparently decided that despite my 1Gb of allotted space, it wasn’t worth keeping my email shoebox anymore. I have lost all data prior to October 22nd 2005 and I don’t know why. I have emailed the giant but a response will take a while. Though I would read those old archived emails once a year or so, the loss of this digital past and this Ikea-an anchorage of a new life in Asia has surprised me.

We are our past, the sums of it, the good additions and the bad subtractions. I take it all in and I translate it my way. The loss of the emails, well, the joy I keep with me internal. It’s not the happy emails I am sad to lose. It’s the extinction of the words that I dreaded re-reading, the words that I flinched to admit that I regret.

I guess we all get used to a certain self inflicted pain that its absence hurts more then the pain itself did. Our justice served internally makes us “better” apparently. We all like to think that our sacrifice now, of the things we think are too good for us, cleanses us, changes us, frees us. We’re just plain fools, not even the silly kind, just plain fools. Justice is with Him. Mercy is with Him. Freedom is with Him. May God drench you with His endless Mercy. *sigh*

Update: Yahoo! restored all my emails within a week. I’m honestly surprised at their Customer Service. My past is once again here.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 29th, 2006 at 3:33 pm and is filed under General Lee.