Throwing away memories?

with Laura, gelato outside the Vatican, 2003


I LOVE photos. We have tons of photos displayed in our house (I just printed a bunch of wedding photos) and I am one of those people who loves to ogle at others' pictures when I visit their houses. I love taking photos and, while we don't yet have a "nice" camera and by no means do I consider either of us talented photographers (we have lots of friends who are!), we are thinking about getting one in the future. I have been a scrapbooker in the past (really just for travel/trips), but really have just not had the time and have just used the blog as a means to post and record pictures. I have been thinking for a while about printing out the blog (there are some programs, like BLURB, where you can make it into a book) to substitute for scrapbooks and photo albums, but haven't made the commitment yet, as it's quite expensive.

Anyway, currently I am struggling with my conflicting desires to preserve memories on one hand, while avoiding accumulating clutter on the other, and specifically trying to figure out what to do with "random photos" which are currently collecting dust on my desk due to my indecision about their fate, but which have been boxed up for long periods in the past. I haven't been a regular photo-printer for quite some time, and so some of these photos are about 5-10 years old, from past graduations, and long-past trips to Europe! I can only imagine that the photo taking (and maybe printing) might increase exponentially if/when we have kids which, believe me, is no time soon, and so I'm trying to make a photo-plan.

So what do I do with random photos from the past? We have maxed out our # of displayable photos. It's fun to recall these photo memories when I see them, unexpectedly, in a shoe box that I open. But I am REALLY trying to be anti-hoard and trying to get rid of things which we don't anticipate seeing/using/looking at in the future and trying to minimize the "stuff" that ends up as storage in the closet. It just seems wrong to throw photos in the trash/recycling, as if I'm "throwing away memories," even if they could be reprinted easily by retrieving the cd or saved images from the computer which I back up regularly. Nevertheless, I feel very stuck and torn. Ideas? What have you done?