And I mean stuff. The things we surround ourselves with. The small statues of a man and a woman from Uzbekistan and Sicily and Peru (yes, I’m obsessed with these renditions of couples), the yarn (guilty), the oddly heart shaped stone or bit of blue sea glass; the photos; the letters and birthday cards. And so much more.
This week I am clearing out my mother’s house. I can’t tell you how many personal essays by students I’ve read about this very thing over the years. It’s a place most of us ultimately go. A heart wrenching sad horrible place.
I hate doing it. But I think once you’ve had to look through your daughter’s stuff after she died, and decide what to keep and what to give away, you are almost numb to this task, because nothing can be worse than looking through her kindergarten papers and odd drawings and hidden candy.
To add to this emotional gumbo, I’m also finally able to copy photos from my family photo albums—the 25 years of having and raising my children, traveling with them from Japan to Peru to Cambodia and beyond, first days of school and Halloween’s, and so much more. For reasons too ugly to write about here, these have been kept from me. I made these albums with such love and care that the condition they’re in—dry, faded, stuck forever to the page—shocked me. But despite the fact they’ve been kept from me, seeing these photos again reminded me how happy I was with my little family, how I loved watching Sam and Grace play with a garden hose (so much so that it takes up three pages of an album) and dressing up for Halloween and walking on Rhode Island’s beautiful beaches. And so much more.
I will say that the pain of divorce can make you forget how once you felt so blessed.
I will say that the pain of losing my mother only reminds me how blessed I was for my own parents.
Someday my kids will be doing what I’m doing this week. They will look at my little Uzbek couple and think how weird I was. They will probably give them away. But I hope as they do they also remember what a fearless traveler I was, how I took them by their little hands and brought them around the world, how I played games and cooked and listened to them. This is what matters more than stuff. And as I look at all of Gogo’s things, I remember her, my mom, wise and honest and vulnerable and big hearted and funny and a great card player. Not one thing I’ve had to decide whether to keep or discard is as important as that.
Some of you are reading this and you are going through the same thing. Hold fast to the memories. The stuff isn’t as important.
This week I am clearing out my mother’s house. I can’t tell you how many personal essays by students I’ve read about this very thing over the years. It’s a place most of us ultimately go. A heart wrenching sad horrible place.
I hate doing it. But I think once you’ve had to look through your daughter’s stuff after she died, and decide what to keep and what to give away, you are almost numb to this task, because nothing can be worse than looking through her kindergarten papers and odd drawings and hidden candy.
To add to this emotional gumbo, I’m also finally able to copy photos from my family photo albums—the 25 years of having and raising my children, traveling with them from Japan to Peru to Cambodia and beyond, first days of school and Halloween’s, and so much more. For reasons too ugly to write about here, these have been kept from me. I made these albums with such love and care that the condition they’re in—dry, faded, stuck forever to the page—shocked me. But despite the fact they’ve been kept from me, seeing these photos again reminded me how happy I was with my little family, how I loved watching Sam and Grace play with a garden hose (so much so that it takes up three pages of an album) and dressing up for Halloween and walking on Rhode Island’s beautiful beaches. And so much more.
I will say that the pain of divorce can make you forget how once you felt so blessed.
I will say that the pain of losing my mother only reminds me how blessed I was for my own parents.
Someday my kids will be doing what I’m doing this week. They will look at my little Uzbek couple and think how weird I was. They will probably give them away. But I hope as they do they also remember what a fearless traveler I was, how I took them by their little hands and brought them around the world, how I played games and cooked and listened to them. This is what matters more than stuff. And as I look at all of Gogo’s things, I remember her, my mom, wise and honest and vulnerable and big hearted and funny and a great card player. Not one thing I’ve had to decide whether to keep or discard is as important as that.
Some of you are reading this and you are going through the same thing. Hold fast to the memories. The stuff isn’t as important.
