What do you cherish?
I’m not a sentimental person. One of my earliest, if not the earliest, memory I have is of losing a precious stuffed animal lamb. I’ve lost many more things I loved throughout the years–the pair of sunglasses I saved up for, my 16th bday present–a camera, even years and years of treasured photos when my wallet was stolen.
The lesson younger me learned was: to love objects is to lose them.
Didn’t help any that my mom is a pragmatist and we had very few knick-knacks growing up. I inherited that gene. I let my poor husband pack one small box of knick-knacks during our move from our apartment to a house.
Over the weekend, I read a post by my friend Elsie Elmore about items that hold special meaning to us. So while her cherished item was a Valet Chair from her father, I had to think really hard about what item I cherish.
And I couldn’t think of any.
I could, however, think of words.
Words are the one thing I’ve kept throughout my life. Wherever I go, whenever somebody leaves me a note that makes me happy, I put it into a file. I’ve been collecting since I was a kid. This is the file:
