My computer crashed – get it over it Tina

So I came back to work last Monday after a week’s vacation to discover my laptop computer was making noises.

Strange noises.

And then those strange noises were followed up by a folder icon, with a question mark on it, flashing on my screen.

It seemed to be saying, “You’re in big trouble, you’re in big trouble,” although the voice inside my head was adding a bit more descriptive colour to just how much trouble I figured I was in.

About two hours later my worst fears were confirmed. My hard drive had crashed…hard. Everything I had on my computer was gone. In my initial moments of numbing silence – during which I was literally screaming on the inside – I felt as if my whole world had crashed too.

You see, there are a few things people may or may not know about me.

1. I tend to be a little melodramatic at times.

2. I’m a pack rat who hates to part with anything.

3. When I want something done, I want it done now, as in right now.

So how was this crashed hard drive going to fit into my persona?

Well, I’m not sure if it was my melodramatic side, or my tad-bit emotional side, that had me sitting on the floor next to reporter Eric Bourque’s desk, my eyes swelling with tears, feeling sorry for myself.

I don’t know if I was more upset over having lost months of photos I had taken, the last seven months of stories I had written, or the colour-coded-alphabetically-sorted-by-year-category-and-issue-date folders that I considered to be my ultimate feat in computer organization.

Which is where my pack rat instincts come in. I’m a person who doesn’t like to part with a lot of stuff. I guess because I never know when I’m going to have to refer back to that brief I wrote in 2003 about some organization holding some fundraiser for some event they had coming up some time.

Which brings me to the third point, about wanting things done right away. When I’m writing a story and I need to refer back to one I’ve written on the subject a few months back, or years ago, I liked being able to click onto my colour-coded-alphabetically-sorted-by-year-category-and-issue-date folders to get the background info I needed in just seconds. Yeah, yeah, I can still do that, only now I have to dig through a pile of CDs, or flip through the pages of past issues, or do a search on our website. Doable, but it’s not the same.

Oh my gosh, this could take minutes.

Still, I’ve decided to see the demise of my computer as an opportunity. My chance to be more selective on what I save and what I delete. My chance to be a little bit more quick on the draw when it comes to backing things up on CD. My chance to even come up with a better system than my colour-coded-alphabetically-sorted-by-year-category-and-issue-date folders.

Because anyone who knows me knows that I’m a ‘the-glass-is-half-full, the-sun-will-come-out-tomorrow’ kind of gal.

Or not.

But seriously, what choice do I have?

And in any event, I’m past the computer thing. After the initial shock came the realization – so what?

Get over it Tina.

Because the thing is, on the same day my computer crashed that afternoon I found myself standing on a road in Brazil Lake, watching a family lose their home and possessions in a fire.

And about an hour after that, I learned someone I know, a friend, had lost her son in a tragic accident.

All I lost that day was some pictures, some words and some folders that probably only I could have navigated through anyway.

Really, I lost nothing.