A disturbing thought came across my mind last week. No, it had nothing to do with the prospects of having 14 inches of snow on the ground and how much of a pain it’s going to be getting to campus and back. It was the thought of seeing my entire college career being wiped clean from my personal archives. It’s not a fear of my hard drive going out or a house fire doing the job; it was at the hands of its own creator.

This idea came about from two different sources. The first was a friend’s Facebook status post, which mentioned trashing his computer folder that was marked “school” with no regrets. The second was an off-hand remark I heard in a classroom from a student who said that he intends to burn all of his school papers after he graduates.

Reading and hearing those comments sent shocking images to my mind about seeing my collected folders of graded work suddenly bursting into flames or reading a message on the computer saying “invalid/deleted files” when I would attempt to open them.

Why would someone wish to do that with four plus years of hard work?

When I was a freshman, I thought it would be a good idea to start saving everything I ever did in college. This was way before I knew we were supposed to make a senior portfolio collecting all of our best work during our college tenure.  Whether it was a good English composition paper, a bad group project or even an ugly test examination, it was placed in the archives and not in the garbage or recycle bin.

One of the most notable relics of my college career is a theater review that I received an “F” on, because it didn’t match the teacher’s criteria. Instead of abandoning my prospects of being a reviewer, I carried on and I hope that the reviews that I’ve written for this paper match that teacher’s criteria now.

Sure, it may be a little embarrassing to see how much worse my writing was back then, but that’s actually a good thing. It shows maturity and progress in learning to master a craft.

It’s also interesting to look back at previous classes that required lots of “reaction papers.” They can be a burden when they’re being written, but within a couple of years, that sensibility is lost and they can turn out to be a great read. To be honest, I completely forgot about taking a class about fairy tales and that our final was a paper about why they are important to our society and culture, and pretty much why we took an entire class about it. I was astonished by all of the thought I put into it, something I probably wouldn’t be able to articulate at this point, so I’m glad I was able to capture it at that moment in time.

I will add that when collecting your material starts to look an episode of “Hoarders,” it’d be best to consider some consolidation. Aside from the standard portfolio project of presenting college material, I think it would be more interesting to make yourself a personalized magazine comprised of all of your paper work. It would be a more attractive way to reminisce, instead of thumbing through the Facebook timeline.

It only takes a second to see all of your college material disappear, but the regret of it all can last for a lifetime. Hopefully you’ll be able to see your good work through all of the pain and suffering you partook in it, rather than wanting to see it being ignited or permanently erased from existence. If you look back at it, you just might find something interesting.