The Things My Parents Didn't Keep

April 26, 2011

Blog Entry #1

Jeanne gave me this blog as a birthday present. The deal is ‘she writes, then I write, etc.’ We take turns, just like we did when we were kids.

But, already, just like when we were kids (and I know, I know, it’s been a lonnnnng time since we were kids!), the whole competitive sister thing pops us. Already I’m reading her entry about going in to our parents’ house to clear it out after they died, and what am I thinking? First, well, I hope that everyone realizes that Jeanne didn’t just sit down and write that beautiful story off the top of her head! See, she’s recently taken several online creative writing courses and I’m pretty sure that her article was carefully crafted for an assignment and then critiqued and eventually fine-tuned into the moving sobriquet (is that actually a word? is that actually the right word?)that it is. So already I’m feeling defensive and competitive and, ugh, less than adequate.

And then, secondly, while I was at Jeanne’s side the whole time we wandered through that house, the whole time we wallowed in the memories of what really was an almost idyllic childhood, while she was being mature and sentimental and all sorts of other great things I don’t have the adjectives for, my most vivid recollection of that day was not what we found, what memories that were evoked. No, what mainly struck me that day was everything that we didn’t find.

Where were all my old bridesmaid dresses that I had left hanging in the closet? Where were all the old scrapbooks I had carefully filled with pressed corsages, dance cards, old birthday cards, and left in a drawer? Where were my old cheerleading pompoms and my red Marshallette boots? Where were all the Nancy Drew books I had collected and read and reread? Where, oh my God, where was my very own signed Elvis Presley photo? “To Ellen, Best Wishes, Elvis...” ?

While Jeanne was being the loving and sentimental daughter, I was being--something else! Not exactly greedy or grasping. After all, I told Jeanne that she could have all the furniture! (And, yeah, I’m betting that may evoke a blog response!!) But I was greedy for all those artifacts of my childhood that I had left behind, assuming that my parents would be thrilled and eager to be careful curators of my own personal childhood museum.

But, instead I was forced to realize that, rather than seeing themselves as preservationists, they had chosen, as a final gift to Jeanne and me, to shed the debris from their lives so that we wouldn’t have the wearisome task of discarding a lifetime of accumulated stuff. (It’s also just possible that my mother wanted the closet space that my old bridesmaids dresses were taking up!)

So, my conclusions...

First, Jeanne writes beautifully and I am going to have to really step it up if I want to share a blog with her.

Secondly, Jeanne is absolutely right that our memories, our stories, are our most precious possessions.

And thirdly, while memories are beautiful things, so are autographed Elvis pictures and red cowboy boots. I currently have a house with a basement filled with my children’s possessions and drawers and cupboards filled with treasures left behind, none of which any of them seem to have any interest in taking to their current homes. But as long as I remain in our big house on Elm Blvd, I’m keeping everything.