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Sunday, March 13, 2005 |
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CHERISHED ITEMS KEPT SINCE CHILDHOOD Bible, a gift from my great-grandmother, a Seventh-day Adventist. The cheap cover has fallen to pieces. It is filled with underlinings. I still refer to it. It has a useful concordance and several nice maps.  Cufflinks my mother wore in the French cuffs of a poofy white shirt, part of my favorite '50s mother-costume ensemble, which comprised the poofy shirt, gold and black houndstooth-print corduroy vest, large wide skirt of black corduroy, and a very wide red leather belt. Cufflinks are gold-colored metal, very large, with pictures of sailing ships under glass.  Stuffed doggie, eyes open and close. Have held onto this since infancy. Co-condemned to many early bedtimes, wherein I spent hours curling and uncurling its ears into "hairstyles." When I was 9 I opened the seam in its belly and hid 13 silver dollars inside.  CHERISHED CHILDHOOD ITEMS LOST 13 silver dollars . Quilt of handstitched one-inch hexagons, made by my great-grandmother. I fantasized about wrapping my babies in it, and passing it on to their babies. My mother forced me to give it away to my aunt when my cousin was born. My aunt has no recollection of this. Whereabouts unknown. My Book House for Children, my most beloved and clung-to possession, the complete set of a '50s edition. Gift from family friends, because for years I had spent all our visits reading and coveting it. Again, this was something I'd give my children. Lost when my mother refused to pack them and let me take them with me to our new apartment when I was 14. Left behind. She promised we'd go back for them. Didn't. Spent the next 35 years reacquiring the set, volume by volume, from used book stores and Web sources. Fantasized about my grandchildren reading them. Not likely.  The Golden Book of Indian Crafts and Lore early '60s edition in orange hardcover, a gift from my cousin Chuckie on my 10th birthday. I worshipped this book. Lost at the same time as My Book House, and for the same reason. I reacquired it in paperback from eBay last year. My first LP, Mary Martin Broadway version of The Sound of Music, bought for me by my mother in 1960? Reacquired from eBay five years ago. CHERISHED ITEMS WITH ME SINCE MY TEENS Old copy of Ring Magazine, from my brother's father, a boxer, wherein he is referred to as a "slam-banger." Saint Francis by Nikos Kazantzakis, a Ballentine paperback I stole in January 1971 from a Christian bookstore in Estherville, Iowa, a week after arrived there as a hitchhiker and two weeks after I turned 18. I read and reread it, and it is filled with underlinings and highlighting.    ITEMS LOST DURING MY TEENS All my books, except for the Bible and Kazantzakis. Losses include a Paul Reps volume with rough wooden cover and sandpaper bookmark, gift from my godmother Jeanne, and a cheap reprint of the Burton translation of the Kama Sutra. All my LPs, including my second-ever-owned LP--Simon & Garfunkle's Sounds of Silence--and third--the Lovin' Spoonful--as well as high-school acquisitions Cream's Disraeli Gears, John Mayall, Johnny Winter's LP-and-a-half, the Broadway soundtrack of Hair, etc. I packed these up in a trunk in July 1973 and left them with Mrs. Greene the day I fled my Iowa husband of two years and, with 11-month-old son strapped to my chest, caught a plane back to L.A. The husband later went to Mrs. Greene, told her we had reconciled, and retrieved them. He sold them all. He had a pesky amphetamine habit. Small baby's crazy quilt, handmade, gift of Mrs. Greene on the occasion of the birth of my first child. I gave this to my son on the occasion of his first child's birth and I never saw it again. I think it went to quilt heaven to be with my other one. White rubber mouth guard in red plastic case, from my brother's boxer father. Now in the possession of my older son. We don't know why. CHERISHED ITEMS KEPT SINCE MY TWENTIES Square iron frying pan. Requested from employers in Denver, September 1973, because they never used it. I made all our brownies in this for many years. Then I stripped it of seasoning in a fire and never re-seasoned it, and so it's rusty. But still with me. Jug-shaped lamp with pullchain. The original shade is long-gone, but the squat lamp has been faithful, though chipped, since 1973. Again, Denver employers.  Antique children's book, my first such, purchased at Denver used book store for my son, who was 18 months old. It is called Little Bear's Laughing Times. Fantasies of grandchildren etc. Tall strange bookshelf, purchased for $10 at the Pasadena Goodwill store and transported home in the back of our '75 Rabbit. Turquoise mixing bowl decorated with concentric rings. Depression-era antique bought from Vose's in Cohasset, north of Chico, with my first True Love John. LPs, in particular Loudon Wainwright III "T-shirt" and soundtracks from the movie musicals Paint Your Wagon, Camelot, and Bandwagon (bought on trade from used record store), Broadway soundtrack albums of "Fiddler on the Roof" (Zero Mostel) and "Man of La Mancha" (gifts from best friend)," "All Hail John Philip Sousa" (gift from history professor/lover), Small wooden shoes, gift of history professor/lover, souvenir of his visit to Amsterdam. Also postcards from the Vatican. THINGS FROM MY TWENTIES I HAVE LOST Small tan bookshelf, purchased for $10 at the Pasadena Goodwill store and transported home in the back of our '75 Rabbit. Lost when I loaned it to a friend's sister in Chico after she moved into a new apartment. Sky blue mixing bowl with fluted sides, Depression-era antique purchased concurrently with foregoing turquoise bowl. Lost when my older son decided to keep all my most precious things and tell me they somehow didn't exist anymore, perhaps never had, what was I talking about? etc., after I'd moved to Bisbee to take classes and left them behind in California in the house he moved into. He couldn't wait for me to die to get them, apparently. I found out what really happened to my things every time I visited his new house and spotted another, and then another. I don't go there anymore, and this is one of the reasons. British saucepan, black enamel-on-steel, from the '20s, purchased with the bowls. Lost when I threw it across the kitchen during a fight with a boyfriend, 1996, and it bent and lost its enamel. I still have the lid, though. CHERISHED ITEMS KEPT SINCE MY THIRTIES LPs, Rickie Lee Jones-Bryan Ferry-Richard Thompson-Peter Gabriel-Kate Bush, et al., left behind by second husband. Norton Anthology of Poetry, also left behind by second husband.  Tacky lime-green Oriental lamp, purchased from Chico's Salvation Army thrift store, 1985. Broken base--needs glue, but still with me. My proudest lamp moment: moving into new house in Chico 1988, the landlord glimpsed it and exclaimed, "Isn't that just the most hideous thing you've ever seen!" 
ITEMS LOVED DURING MY THIRTIES THAT I HAVE LOST Tablecloths acquired from yard sales, three very old cotton patterns I loved very much: gray-white-brown pussy willows on a turquoise background; turquoise-black-orange fishes in the style of the early '60s, on a white background; Mexican scenes on white. Among the things my son took (see "bowl," above). Very large world globe, old, heat-damaged and crinkly. Among the things my son took (see "bowl," above). Small globe-shaped raku-glazed ceramic lamp. Ditto. Green polyester sleeping bag, left behind by second husband after he was given a down bag, one of several cherished souvenirs of my second marriage. I buried my yellow Labrador Retriever in it two years ago, because he had so loved to sleep on it. CHERISHED ITEMS KEPT WITH ME SINCE MY FORTIES Antiques, saffron-yellow kitchen work table, 1880s New Home-brand treadle sewing machine in oak case, faux-bamboo chair with flaking paint and remains of horse painting on seat   FORTIES LOST ITEMS "Redna" (1997), a 1972 Volkswagen Westfalia camper van, completely restored and with newly rebuilt engine, totaled in 1997 by an ex-boyfriend who needed to borrow it for an hour the week before I was to drive away in it to Bisbee for herb school. Thistle and Hemlock/"Little Dream" farm, my One True Home, 26-1/2 acres with two houses, 100-year-old big red barn, stable, hog barn, granary, woods, creek, orchard, bought for $135,000 when I was 48 years old, semipurposely lost a week shy of foreclosure during a bankruptcy declared when I was 51 in order to make a housemate (my Second True Love, friend of 20 years) leave, because he'd refused to do so even though I'd been begging him to for three of the five years he'd been there. Part of my apparently still-in-progress slide into madness. Tan 1969 Volkswagen Beetle, bought from best friend in 1990. Lovingly driven for eight years. Camped-in at Pyramid Lake (1992) and Death Valley (1994), lived-in for parts of 1994 and '95. Passed down temporarily in 1998 to younger son, who drove it to Portland. Kept on Thistle & Hemlock farm in disrepair from 1999 and finally parted with in 2004 during move to current dwelling. 1989 black Chevy Blazer S10, purchased in 2000 from best friend (but never paid for), given to housemate/Second True Love to facilitate his departure, December 2003. CHERISHED ITEMS ACQUIRED AND KEPT SINCE I TURNED 50 RECENTLY ACQUIRED ITEMS LOVED AND LOST 2:44:24 PM  comment []
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