The relief of digital organization

I have a confession. Remember when I wrote about downsizing my parents’ home, then wrote a book about it, as if I had this all on lockdown? Well, I did clear the house out, figured out what to keep, toss and sell, and sold the old homestead — all inside a month. But what I didn’t tell you was that I hit a hard stop at the photos.

I cleared the boxes of snapshots and carousels of slides ( my dad’s preferred photographic medium) from my parents’ home all right. But then I parked them at my brother’s home in Los Angeles, where they’ve remained for three years in his garage stacked in a pile up to my elbows.

When I sorted through my family home, I simply did not have time to go through each image, nor did my brother. So our plan was for us to get together one night when I was back in town, open a bottle of wine, go through them, laugh, cry, make fun of each other, and feel nostalgic together.

Then we’d pull out the ones we wanted to keep and send them to a scanning service. This, by the way, is still a very good plan.

And, likemany very good plans, this one, too, has remained a plan.

I’m thinking aboutmy parents’ photos andmy own family’s photos, feeling guilty and remiss recently while at a conference titled “Don’t Leave Your Kids aMess.”

DianaUricchio, owner ofOXO Digital Organizing in Orlando, Fla., was speaking about digital organizing, and Iwas feeling like a hypocrite.

“I can’t even stay on top of my own photos, and I’ve also got my parents’ to deal with,” I confess to Uricchio afterward.

When she started her business three years ago, after helping her mother-in- lawtame her collection of important papers and photos, Uricchio’s intentwas to help people digitize important documents, but today 90 percent of her business is digitally organizing photos.

“Given the cascade of images most of us now have with cellphones and digital sharing, organizing the present feels impossible, let alone the past,” I vent.

“It’s probably the most emotionally draining and time- consuming project you can do,” she said, which made me feel marginally better. “But it is also one of the most rewarding, because you’re doingwhat the adults in the family should do, take care of the history.” And I feltworse again.

“What makes people hit the breaking point and fix this?” I asked, hoping if I sounded as if Iwere conducting a professional interviewthat would cover upmy crumbling veneer of competence.

“Many want to cut the clutter, conquer the mayhem and downsize their material footprint,” she said. “Others want to streamline, so they can find what they want more easily; a third motivator is security. Clients worry about what would happen to their important documents and photos in case of fire, flood or hurricane.

I’m nodding, but a small part of me is thinking the unthinkable: What a relief!

Another reason is so they can share. “Digitizing family photos and organizing them into albums can make the difference between family members reviewing their past and never looking at family photos at all,” she said. “If they’re not being organized, they won’t be enjoyed.” “How well I know,” I said. “When they’re done, they feel great that a very important task that they should be doing for their family is now finally done,” she said.

“I can only imagine.”