Personal Effects Detritus of sixty-some odd years added to the 'must keeps' of the parental sort. Meaningful to them, to him but not the kids, We don't need more stuff; downsizing they say. Don't have time to dust or rearrange to accommodate the bits and pieces of his life. We have our memories, pictures. Have a garage sale. Your room isn't very big, you know... How do you price a memory? Gauge its worth? Sure, he saved for three months to buy this or that-- that matters little now. How do you haggle over a life collected? Band medals earned, a result of endless hours' practice preserved behind glass on faded felt. Hanger shaped letter sweater with dust-lined shoulders. Even Goodwill will shake its head. Moth-eaten; won't keep anyone warm. Someone will want the fifty-year old Ludwigs but never for the money's worth let alone the value of endless nights listening, watching him play. Someone may want a two-hundred year old bedroom set carved from black walnut trees felled on the family farm. But they won't care or have known the six generations of children born in that bed or the great-great-great uncle who created and then died in it. besides, no one uses full-sized beds anymore. Sad to think of flotsam selling for five dollars or fifty cents. Kids too busy to help. Grandma, we have swim practice or scouts or want to hang out at the mall. One might be tempted to simply hang on to everything as the folks did. Valuables valued; for years insured against loss now nothing more than a pile by the side of the road on trash day. Picked up and casually, carelessly tossed into the maw that crunches, snacks on yesterdays. Then, always hungry for more, drives on down to the next stop. A missed photo, black and white with rippled edges flutters in the wind then skitters like last leaf. Snowing again today. Will winter ever end? |