Pictures and a new kind of pack rat.

I just returned from a beautiful wedding in North Carolina. It was a wonderful time -- great to see family and meet new people who will become part of my life and David's life.

I came home and uploaded some pictures from my digital camera. I didn't take many because Steve, Dave's dad, took plenty -- as did many other people. As I get them, I will put a few online. For now, there is a picture of Brian, my ridiculously funny brother-in-law, wrestling with Dave. I'm quite proud of the action shot.

With this wedding, and with many other occasions, I have started thinking about where I am going to put all the pictures I have. Between Dave and I, we have about 10 actual picture albums with about 200-300 pictures sitting in boxes. I stopped printing a lot of pictures after my nephews were born because I just can't keep up! My hard drives are filling up with MP3s and pictures (I thought I would never use 60 gigs. Boy was I wrong.), and I have mountains of CDs with pictures on them. What will I do with all of these? I have been told that the CDs only last about 7 years. What will I do then? Is this really something I should be freaking out about?

What it amounts to is this: I have too many pictures. I have too much stuff. It isn't in my house; the lack of space keeps me under control. It is in my computer and on CDs. Is it necessary to keep it all? Will I ever look at it? I know wedding pictures and baby pictures are priceless, but with digital cameras and 512 megabyte memory cards, is a picture really worth a thousand words?