The Trash/Memories Found Under My Car Seats

Does this picture look familiar or at least some version of it? Have you ever reached under the seats in your car and extracted Pokemon cards, Goldfish cracker remnants and action figures? Have you ever looked in a cup holder only to find rocks, peanut shells, and or Tootsie Pop wrappers? I'm hoping that I am not alone and your answer is "yes" because the contents in the picture above were recently dug out from under the third row seats of our family SUV and this is only part of what I found!

My initial reaction was OMG--my kids are pigs, they are using my car as their personal trash can. I then started crafting my lecture on no more eating in the car as I pulled handfuls upon handfuls of junk from under the seats. But as I tossed the debris onto the pavement, I realized that this trash was bringing back great memories. How is that for seeing the glass half full? My anger quickly dissipated as I walked down memory lane.

For example, the little green alien (lying in the middle of the pile in the photo above) that was a once well-loved prize. My son won it at Laser Quest. He celebrated his 12th birthday there and to keep him and his restless guests entertained as they waited to enter the Activation Chamber, I gave them all a few quarters to play the arcade games. The prizes received were not worth the 50 cents paid but they do bring back memories of a great day. A day where 8 excited tweens (and one dad) created goofy code names, wore black and tried not to get tagged.

The Pokemon card reminded me of how much my boys love Bulbasaur, Pikachu, Squirtel and Chimchar. I pictured them with their heads close together examining how many damage points each character has and what each character evolves into. It also made me wonder why my kids can easily memorize all of these details but can't remember their math facts.

The Halloween pencil was given to one of my 8 year old boys during his Halloween party at school. When I looked at that it called to mind numerous Princesses, witches and Storm Troopers parading around the school blacktop. I recalled rambunctious kids with chocolate covered faces making Halloween treat bags while listening to the Monster Mash.

After spending way too long reminiscing (and not cleaning), I realized I was getting carried away. This was trash after all and it should have ended up in the garbage can, not the crevices and carpets of my car! So, I gathered my brood together and after a short lecture we all pledged to work together to keep our car clean. Moments later, they saw the pile of goodies on the pavement and began shouting, "That's mine!" Evidently all this trash brought back memories for them too--the I remember that is mine kind!