While washing dishes one morning, I received a phone call. It was my mother. She was out for a walk with my father. They were discussing the new addition Dad had just built onto their existing house. Mom was explaining to my father about all the new furniture and décor that would be going into the new addition and what things needed to be given away. The phone call was about a jewelry box which had made the list. Mom wanted to know if I wanted it before she donated it to a local thrift store.
The jewelry box was made of dark cherry wood and stood about four feet tall. To her the jewelry box had served its purpose and it was time to move on. For, where could an old jewelry box find refuge in an exquisitely captivating farmhouse? It would only be in the way.
Knowing my ability to speak my mind, I knew my mother was ready for my thoughts on the matter. First, I picked up my rag from off the floor that I had dropped out of shock. Then, I started in, respectfully with the history of that jewelry box.
It was 1994. My folks had just built their first home in Pierre, SD on Dry Run Road the previous fall. Mom had her eye on a jewelry box she had seen at JC Penny. Every time we went in the store, she wanted to walk by it just to take another glance at it. It was a perfect match to their cherry wood bedroom set they had recently purchased.
Valentines Day was now fast approaching. Dad took us girls with him into JC Penny to purchase the jewelry box for Mom. He paid for it with hard earned money from breaking a horse or working at the sale barn. It would have been quite a pinch for him in those days to have made such a purchase. But Dad was always putting Mom’s desires above his own.
Most of the time, Dad would make sure Brittney and I were with him when he did sweet things for Mom. He knew something we didn’t. A young girl, when she is all grown up, will look for someone like her daddy to fill her heart. He knew prince charming would have an amazing resemblance to himself, so, he had better set the bar high.
To all my fathers out there, make sure you are charming.
When I recently asked my dad about the jewelry box, he said, “I have had the privilege of hearing the sound of necklaces clanging each time she opens the door to extract another gem from inside. I am a little tender that way. Of course with your mother, it’s a pin the tail on the donkey for what she is sentimental about. I am the one blindfolded; been that way forty years. Oh, that everyone could have a love like ours.”
Thinking of this jewelry box, my mind began to drift to a conversation I had with a lady while standing in line somewhere. We were talking about our children and all their precious work they bring home. I thought we were on the same page until she told me how she took photos of the school work or crafts her kids brought home, then threw the originals in the trash. She said she didn’t want to be bothered keeping up with all that stuff. I was stunned speechless (imagine that). Standing there I thought of Eva Jewel’s artwork and ABCs that I have plastered all over the walls. I thought of the files I already have stored away from each year, and how important they are to me, and she is only four. This lady was missing the point of the breadcrumbs; the trail we leave behind. If life isn’t about the packed attic full of sentiments crowding the narrow walkway, then what’s the point? Thirty years from now I want to be able to touch and feel those little years, not plug them in from my USB port and scan through cold computer files.
A perfectly clutter free life is empty. The house becomes more like a surgical unit than a home; not that I am encouraging us to become the next hoarders of America, but having too many puzzles, crayons, and stuffed animals lying all around shows a life that is full. I would rather have a cluttered house with crowded memories than a sterile surgical suite of forgotten files.
Three years ago, I was visiting my Aunt and Uncle. They are immaculate people. They have a beautiful home with everything in its place. I would be very nervous to bring Eva Jewel there and I certainly would not want to see my nephew, Ben, in that house (my sister will get a kick out of that). One morning, I had gotten up early to have tea and visit with them when I noticed the blanket my aunt was covered up with. It was a Spider Man sleeping bag. Obviously, I asked her to explain because Spider Man didn’t fit her color scheme at all. She smiled as if many years had just been compounded into that one moment and said, “It was my son’s from when he was little. It is one of my most prized possessions.”
The value of many of the furniture pieces that grace our homes goes far beyond what fits the newest look of the AT HOME spring line. It is never the overpriced Bernhardt lamps that we treasure, but the Spider Man sleeping bag and old jewelry box that seem to hold no purpose except to the one grasping on to it. I love what Marilla Cuthbert tells Anne in the movie Anne of Green Gables, “Don’t throw it all away on some ridiculous ideal that doesn’t exist.”
Mom couldn’t speak for the tears obstructing her speech when I had finished my thoughts towards the jewelry box. She later told me how sometimes the past gets clouded by the present but hearing it told from someone else’s vantage point brings us back to true north.
It has been nearly thirty years now, since that cold February day when the jewelry box was purchased. It now sits in the guest master bedroom beside the bed like a silent monument that radiates brightly as the sun comes through the window, causing the cherry wood to glisten from years of lemon scented Pledge that polished its finish. It is still filled with treasured pieces garnered over the years, but the most precious treasure inside is the love and sacrifice that it took to buy it, along with the memories it continues to hold. I have a feeling another generation will grow up with the familiar sound of the door opening, and necklesses dangling against the side; a sound that will remind us of home.
Happy Valentines Day
“Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.” Romans 12:10
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