To Delete or Not to Delete - That IS the Question

I decided to go to the movies the another day. Ya, that's quite the shocker. I saw Forgetting Sarah Marshall - again. I know, another shocker. There's a funny scene where Peter is deleting all of his pictures of Sarah and him off his computer. His stepbrother tells him that he wasn't doing a permanent delete. Peter says that he knows but he wants to have a copy, you know, just in case they get back together. His stepbrother sidesteps him and does that permanent delete thing and Peter screams -noooooo. I felt his pain. I know how he feels. I've been there.

About 6 months ago I did a purge of all of my pictures of my deficient ex-boyfriend. I had saved all the text messages, the emails, the sms messages and the pictures - just in case. In case of what? Emergency? The first picture that I deleted was really hard. It was such a symbol of the end. As if I didn't know it already ended. He dumped me right on my ass. There was absolutely no misunderstanding there. One day I decided that I just couldn't cry any more. I think that the breakup aged me and I didn't like what I was seeing in the mirror. I was tired all the time and I'd just had enough. No matter how difficult it was going to be, I had to move on. Clearly, bonehead had so why wasn't I? So one day, I just did it. I deleted and deleted and deleted some more. Any event, anything that brought memories. Gone.

I felt really good about getting rid of all of those ghosts until ... I realized that I hadn't done a permanent delete and kept finding the pictures in other areas of my computer. How many times had I loaded the same pictures onto my home and work computer? Apparently many, many times. They were everywhere, like the proverbial skeletons in the closet. They kept popping up at inopportune times. I had to delete again and again. And frankly, it wasn't easier the second or third time around. There was that little (ok, maybe medium sized) part of me that still wanted those pictures - just in case.

The real beauty of it all, is truthfully, by deleting those pictures, I've progressed to the next step towards the goal of complete annihilation of him from my mind. Sometimes I wonder if he's deleted the pictures of me from his computer. Frankly, I don't think he's really given it much thought. Plus, I think he actually only had one picture anyway. Luckily I looked really good in it. Then again, maybe he didn't delete it, just in case...