“It’s just a few stacks of old records and some chairs; it’s really not that much.”

Those were the words used by my mother to lure me into a storage unit in the old Fred’s department store building downtown.

I used to ride my bike to Fred’s with my friends. We would hurry inside from the summer heat, our shorts pockets full of one-dollar bills and quarters, most likely collected from odd jobs we had talked neighborhood adults into allowing us to do. We always left with something different: a pack of baseball cards, candy cigarettes or a can of Cheerwine cola. The latter we would drink, then swerve around on our bicycles pretending to be inebriated. I bet if I looked hard enough, my old retainer is buried somewhere in a crevice of that building.

And so goes life, as does change. Now that building is crammed full of climate-controlled storage units. I’m sure if you could see behind a few of the roll-up doors, you might be able to find some old baseball cards or candy cigarettes in a dusty old box. I can only imagine what people keep in storage. It’s a pretty strange concept when you think about it. What are we holding on to all of this stuff for anyway?

I guess there’s an allotted time that we allow certain objects to overstay their welcome in our homes before being banished to a life sentence in an air-conditioned aluminum room. In particular, items that are not ready for the landfill but not important enough for the attic. Therefore, they go to a storage unit because you never know when you may find the need for a rocking chair with one arm or the original soundtrack vinyl of “Annie.”

I can’t blame my mother for storing some of the items that we hauled to her unit. By and large, a record collection is something passed down through generations despite its reputation for collecting dust. In movies, you always see an old vinyl pulled off the shelf and dust blown from its surface before placing it on the turntable. Symbolism can be a cruel reminder of passing time. So rather than look at it, we hide it away for $100 a month.

As I placed the last stack of Everly Brothers and Minnie Riperton LPs onto the stained cloth seat of a dining table chair, I paused for thought. One curiosity was the stain on the chair. I’m pretty sure it was Cheerwine, most likely spilled by 10-year-old me in a drunken state of caffeine and sugar. The next thought I had was, are we finished?

As I walked out of the storage unit, my mother looked at my sister and me and said, “Where is the lock?” We had hung her master lock from a rope handle on the roll-up door in order to not lose it.

After finger-pointing, head-scratching and looking underneath a 1968 copy of Glen Campbell’s “Wichita Lineman,” we couldn’t find the lock anywhere. Then with a disheartened look on her face, my mom said, “Are we in the wrong unit?”

I spun in circles as if that would provide the answer and then suddenly noticed the lock hanging from the rope of the door next to us. We had put everything in the wrong unit.

There are always two schools of thought about the right thing to do in such a situation; sometimes both can be correct. I considered closing the door, locking it and calling the owner to tell him we’d like to swap units, but my mother had already begun moving Glen Campbell to his new home. A decision was undoubtedly made.

After a small amount of delirious laughter, we went our separate ways.

I arrived home and parked my truck, then began to remove a few of my mother’s belongings that I saw fit to lean in the corner of my carport rather than her storage unit. A natural selection of unwanted junk was taking place, and these few items survived to see the light of day, if only for a while.

I’m sure I’ll be returning to that old Fred’s building soon, hopefully to drop off some more of my mother’s stuff rather than retrieve it. Albeit I know that inevitable day will come when my mother goes to the big storage unit in the sky and I’ll be left with two options: Pay $100 a month or retrieve her things from storage.

And so goes life, as does change. That day will inevitably come. So if you find me relaxing in a one-armed rocking chair singing along to “Wichita Lineman,” kindly mind your business, because a decision was undoubtedly made.

Clay Bowen is a Columbus native who cooked professionally as a chef in fine dining for 12 years and appeared on the third season of Top Chef. He is also a licensed landscape horticulturist. Email him at [email protected].

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