Keepsakes
“Not
everything worth keeping has to be useful.” Cynthia Lord (Rules)
I
have a small, gold locket that belonged to my grandmother, Mayda. On
the outside, there is a circle of tiny pearls and inside the circle,
a filigreed rose. Inside the locket are photographs of my father and
uncle. Just their faces are cut out and pressed into tiny round
frames. I never saw my grandmother wear this locket. The loop that
held it onto a chain has been broken for as long as I can remember.
The photos of her sons were taken when they were young men, so I
believe she wore it while they were in the Pacific, fighting in World
War II.
It
passed to me in 1980, when she died with both sons by her side. I
take the locket out of my jewelry box now and then, to open the
latch and look at the photos. Both men were handsome, full of “piss
and vinegar”, as we say around here. I wonder what it was like for
her, having already lost one child to pneumonia and her husband to
lung cancer, to have her remaining children in the line of fire. Did
she lie awake nights worrying about them? Did she hold the locket
when she prayed for them?
The
locket means something to me even though it is broken and not
valuable by the world's standards. I also have a leather satchel,
containing all the drawings and paintings my children did when they
were preschool aged. The papers are now brown and brittle with age,
the paint is faded. Someone else will have to throw them away when
I'm no more.
It's
interesting to me what we humans keep and what we throw away. We are
strange and sentimental creatures. We form attachments to objects
because they remind us of a happy time in our lives, or of a personal
hurdle we leapt, or of someone we love. It feels as though that
memory, or that person is somehow contained within the object and to
throw it away is to throw away them as well. I can't explain this; I
just know it is so.
I'll
bet you possess keepsakes that have no intrinsic value. It's not a
new phenomenon. Humans have been saving special objects since they
could stand upright and use their opposing thumbs. Sometimes when
archeologists open ancient graves they find trinkets and mementos
belonging to the person who is buried there.
What
are your cherished possessions? What do you value even though it has
no usefulness? Soul connections, every one.
In
the spirit,
Jane
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