Art or your own things you've messed up, ruined entirely or mostly

I've been going through my stuff, of which I have much, even though I've severely tossed a lot before this. I admire minimalist design and get the philosophical connotations to that, but I'm a hunter gatherer of the beauty of stuff. I'll just nod yes that it is a flaw, a flaw that impedes mobility, but so it goes.

Not all my stuff is my stuff. I lost my parents relatively early and still harbor some of their stuff. I had a satisfying marriage for many years before it went south in a handbasket and have memories of good times and travels and retain some items from back then. But, dammit, do I have to keep those stupid green glass plates that his mother had kept all that time? (no)
I still have stuff from my last career, a career I liked, so I find it hard to chuck things from then. I'm working up a list of the books and tools and will offer them to some places here in Albuquerque. Or face using craig's list.

I've long known I'm a materialist, that liking looking at people, dogs and cats and birds, land, and things is what gets me up in the morning. I'm very visually oriented, tactile oriented.

So, I've photos of this and that (it figures). I'm going through them to cull.

Just now I ran across a photo I took of a painting my parents had, that I one sunny day completely ruined. The same day, minutes after I took a photo.

It turns out I ruined this one man's art work not just once but twice.

Somewhere in time, maybe very early forties, a person my father knew made some casts and then forged the U.S. Army Air Force seal. This was Charles Wood, aka Chuck. There were three casts made. One went to my father and is now in my ex brother in law's garage, hung on the wall. One went to general Hap Arnold. The third, I've no idea. (I would have been something like two years old).

Chuck Wood was a painter as well as sculptor. He painted a baby picture of me, which I do still have (eh!!) and, this I liked better, a sort of california impressionist painting of a house. That's the painting I killed, after carrying it around for years. Will post a photo.

The painting was nice and sort of cruddy and I took it out to the front porch to clean it, using first a gentle spray of the hose. And last, since before my eyes, the painting flaked off the canvas. I still cringe, cannot believe I did that, and that was thirty years ago. The painting had more zing than in this photo, subtle zing.



The plaster of paris cast of the AAF insignia cracked at some point - I don't remember how, some simple bad move by me, but I remember the gut wrenching feeling I had. I somehow put it back together and now it looks like it has a few chips on the edges. Or does if bro-in-law still has it.

So, tell me how you have messed up. . . . .