This morning I went through an old wine box made of wood. One time, a long time ago, I received a trio of wines before I even knew how to drink wine, and received this trio as a Christmas gift. The wine was shared – and was good to drink, but I couldn’t part with the box. And so it remained.
For a long time I didn’t know how I would use it, this simple pine box, but it was of a good design, with a sliding door, but then slowly I found myself storing birthday cards and letters from my grandmother and brother, and kept the concert stubs and the movie stubs, the cut-outs of favorite editors that sparked my interests; Haley’s Comet – I made it to Jones Beach on a cold November at 3 a.m to watch that one; the day JFK Jr died – I was on Block Island, the same body of water his plane went down in, his watery grave, the same ocean I swam in only the day before, covered the news. I kept that clipping.
Over the years the box grew larger and larger with news clippings, birthday cards, love letters, more movie stubs, pictures were now tossed in of my friend’s children, my nieces and nephews graduation announcements, the death notices I’d collected. I could hardly pick up the box, it had grown that much.
Since the beginning of the year I have thought about going through it – the stuff I’d collected since 1979, way before my collective spirit and the events that shaped me and made me, out of pure survival, become so hard; me, then, a lamb, a cognitive and curious soul, an innocent – but I was prepared to face my past, and my past was in that box.
In that box were dead things from people who were dead and their wishes were long gone and I was wrong to keep their memories in a box. It was time they be set free. If I could get rid of their vanished thoughts, I’d be better now to face them rather than have their well wishes wind up in some Ephemera show at a sports arena in some strange and faraway place.
I didn’t read everything, and I went through it quite clinically, saying aloud, “You’re not in my life…you’re not in my life…” flip, throw out the card; “You’re dead….you’re re-involved…” flip, throw out the card. Some memories failed me and I found myself asking, ‘Who did I see that concert with?’ I couldn’t remember.
Then there were Brian’s letters, several of them. He was an old friend – best friend. We had been friends since we were 10. He died in 1996 of AIDS, I was by his side. He loved me. I kept his cards, all his letters. I remember when he died I couldn’t travel from St. Vincent’s in New York, and so returned to his apartment for one last look, one last time. On his kitchen table, he’d written on a simple tablet, his own hand, and put down these thoughts, “Oh, Dear God, why? Why, why, why?” I took the letter from the tablet – it was very personal and I know I should not have, but I did. I stored the letter (it was much lengthier and charged with emotional turmoil than I can say here), but I folded the letter and threw it away. It was his talk with God and I had no business in keeping it.
Then there were the love letters. ..I kept some of those to help remind me how I once believed in love. I saved all my old driver’s licenses – it’s amazing how I’ve aged, and I find it curious that the ID’s really show the timeline. I came across a picture of my brother Victor and I – I was happy about that, and I will get that picture framed (I’d forgotten about it). The cards and letters from my old friend Elaine, were kept. I read those today, not all, but some, and I realize how much she once cared about me. But people change and you can’t hold them to the person they want to be now. In some letters she talked about her husband, “Big and Ugly” Gary, before we even knew he would die within 10 years.
Inside the box I’ve made room for the people who are in my life now, for the events, for the new news of my life, for whatever new challenges I face, whatever new concerts I may attend. But in the bottom corner of the box, I had folded away an old calendar page (I remembered keeping it). It spoke about my love of nature, because I always loved nature far more than anything I could ever love and admire, was a poem by Joyce Kilmer and inside of this was the hair clippings of my cat Angelo of 17 years. And because he loved outside as much as me, I gave him this poem: “I think that I shall never see A poem as lovely as a tree. Poems are made by fools like me, But only God can make a tree”
Some things should never be thrown away.
copyright, Terry Rachel 2012
Some Things Should Never Been Thrown Away
A Hardscrabble Daughter 