Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Treasures


When I was a little girl, I couldn't wait to grow up and have a house of my own. I always loved all of my mother's treasures and started at an early age to collect treasures of my own. I couldn't wait to buy furniture, dishes, pots and pans and all of the other items necessary to make up a home.

When I was in high school, my best friend, Nancy, and I could go on for hours about the apartment we would get when high school was over. We would decorate it in our favorite colors, hers in shades of green, mine in sunshine yellow. Nancy got married right out of high school and I was so envious when I visited the home she set up with her new husband.

At 25, I finally moved out of my parents house, much to their dismay, and got my own apartment. I had hand-me-downs from wherever I could get them and slowly replaced things with items of my own choosing as money allowed. I got married shortly thereafter and was so happy to finally set up a real home with all of my own things. I spent years accumulating the treasures that made my heart sing. I would always love to just sit in one of my rooms and look around at all of my beautiful things and how nice something looked here or there. Through the years, it was such a sense of accomplishment to be able to acquire things that I had spent years longing for.

I've always had a penchant for dishes. I love changing out the dishes in my china cabinet for the seasons. I love my sets of dishes for Spring, Halloween and Christmas and other assorted patterns thrown in between. I love my placemats, chargers and napkin rings. I love my collections of Santa's, books and bric-a-brac. I am now content with all that I have and am more selective about the things I choose to acquire. Never thought I'd see the day!

My mother no longer lives in her own home, though it is still there, fully stocked. My mother-in-law passed away in May 2009. Both of these influential women in my life spent many years of their lives acquiring their own treasures. When life goes on, our treasures remain as somewhat of a memorable part of what we loved and held dear. Treasures are just objects and certainly not worthy of fretting over, but they are what they are and I am overwhelmed with the treasures of lives well-lived and loved but now these treasures are distant traces of days gone by.

So, what to do with all of these treasures? Women's treasures. Can you just imagine? I am sentimental, but I have my own treasures. My children will want their own treasures. We are all distinct human beings with our own thought processes, wants, desires and treasures that are significant of the road we each have travelled. It's somewhat difficult to discard some things that were so important to the most special women in my life.

Why can some people just toss and others treasure?

1 comment:

Sandy said...

Wow, this is a good one. I'm with you on the collection of treasures, only now that I'm older, I'm afraid I have to start weeding out what I don't need and just keep what I love. Perhaps that's the same with the women that you love. Maybe you could weed out the things you know they probably didn't find that important and keep the things you know they loved and held dear to them. I used to love going to estate sales and purchasing just a few items from the person who passed away. I know that may be little weird, but my mom didn't hold on to anything, so this was my way of perhaps inheriting something from another person.

Anyway, good luck, I know it can be very difficult and time consuming. I guess just one step at a time is all you can do.