70,000 Emails & Counting

As I was trying to clean out today's email Inbox I happened to glance at the number and could not believe my eyes.  Was it really 70,000 emails or do I need reading glasses?  Nope, it really is 70,000.  How did I get to this crazy place?

My bloated email inbox feels like the experience of gaining ten pounds but not really seeing them until you try on new clothing in front of a full length mirror.  Likewise, it's suddenly realizing that it's been almost four years since my husband died.  Ten pounds?  Four years?  70,000 emails?  Yikes.

In a way, my sudden realization of the insanity of my email inbox is a lot like life.  If you don't pay constant attention to the little things, they tend to go slightly out of control.  Next thing you know those ten pounds are twenty, four years are eight and 70,000 emails are 150,000.

I'm actually not sure my notebook could survive that many emails in my inbox.

In case you're wondering, yes, my  fav notebook is armed with all the latest spam filters to block junk emails.  99% of my email is legit.  The problem? I receive a lot of business related "stuff".  I also receive constant monitoring on all sorts of business related stats for HairBoutique.com and the Marketplace, our e-store.

At this point I feel like someone getting ready for a big garage sale and not wanting to part with anything.  UGH.  I admit that I am a recovering control freak.  So the thought of just blindly deleting makes me physically ill.

In my defense, after my husband died in 2005, I found some folder I had stashed away stuffed with emails from him.  I also found a few voice mails in those same email folders which I still listen to.  Being an email packrat has some advantages.

I know I had to do something pretty quickly or I risk a total Inbox meltdown....so I have decided to spend the rest of my weekend sorting, deleting and agonizing over what emails I need to permanently stash.