Surrounded by Memories

I wrote much of this in mid-August, while I was still going through things at the house. Then, between a lack of internet access, a surfeit of work and fatigue, and that pesky appendectomy, I didn't get back to it until now. Therefore, it is both past and present.

I'm making progress. Here I am, surrounded by memories and the realization of the final aspects of my losses and how my life will never be the same, and I'm not bawling my eyes out.

I'm placing tags on things from many lives — mine, my mom's, my grandma's, my father's and brother's and step-father's — breaking them down into prices dividing them into proceeds.

Who will buy my little brother's bb gun? It isn't special — it doesn't have a brand name on it and some of it is plastic, but it stood up to the use of a young boy and his friends.

The ceramic young man and woman in pink and blue that have been in my mother's bedroom since I can remember: where will they stand next?

What about Grandma's teddy bears? She had even more than I do! I hope they will bring lots of love to many children. I wonder who will buy her small teddy bear Christmas tree that Mom and I made for her one year?

There are two sets of silver (plate): one from my paternal grandmother and one from my maternal grandmother. I don't use silver, nor will I use my mother's china, so I hope someone finds joy in them.

I'm not sure if anyone will find joy in the slightly creepy apple knickknacks from the kitchen. They are all anthropomorphized apples with small utensils as arms and legs — some are whole, some have a slice or a bite out of them, and one poor thing is just a slice with no arms. Make that very creepy.

I've held back a couple of milk glass and cut glass pieces that give me great pleasure, including a small, flattened hobnail milk glass vase with a ruffled edge that makes me smile every time I look at it.

There are quite a few things that I am mailing back to myself, such as the lime-green blown-glass float and the rest of the clothes I brought or had sent to me last summer. (I'm mailing back that little ruffled vase, too. After all, it makes me smile!)

I suppose this isn't the very end of the line: I have boxes and boxes of photos and negatives to go through. I have files to go through to determine if they contain any valuable or necessary information. I suppose having an unending amount of tedious tasks could be considered a legacy.

——

This is now.

Later, after the estate sale was over, I went back to the house with a couple of friends to get my mom's RAV4, which had been left next door, and a table I had held back for me. 

A dumpster stood at the edge of the driveway. Kem opened it to see what was inside — small things that hadn't sold and hadn't been worth donating, I guess. On the very top of the pile, folded and clean and priced at $1.00, was the Christmas stocking that I made for Mom many years ago! I couldn't believe that it hadn't sold, and I couldn't believe that I hadn't seen it beforehand. The body is two kinds of ivory silk and the cuff is a thick ivory velvet; the stocking is draped with small ivory faux pearls. If Kem hadn't looked in that dumpster, I'd have lost that stocking forever.

The house was nearly empty. Only the few pieces of furniture the homebuyers bought were left, and they were out of place. The house felt cold and our voices echoed without all the furniture and the knickknacks and just things. 

I'm glad I saw the house like that. I'm glad I could go away remembering it as something other than my mother's house. Memories are good, but I don't want to be pulled and tugged about by them. I want memories that comfort me, not memories that hurt.

So I take comfort in knowing that people are out there, enjoying my brother's bb gun, my mother's pink and blue boy and girl, and my grandmother's teddy bears. 

I wonder who bought the creepy apples?