Losing My Treasures

LOSING MY TREASURES

  They are coming today to take it all away. Their battalion of army ants will strip me of my possessions and my value. Their mops and brooms will wash away my defenses. They will rip the very life out of my soul and leave me without the armor that has shielded me for so long. There will be no way to protect myself. Everything that I have lovingly collected, stored away for rainy days, and caressed with my eyes and hands each day as I walk the narrow but ample pathway from room to room will be gone—tossed into foreign heaps, hauled away by cold, stoic trash trucks, and discarded onto ever growing mounds of misunderstood treasures stolen from so many misunderstood people. I have feared this day for twenty years and it has finally arrived. 

  I should never have let my daughter through the front door. I should have told her to get back on the plane that flew her unannounced across the county, determined to ruin my way of life. I knew my greatest fear would be realized when I saw the look on her face as she peered in through the screen door and then angrily wrenched it open from my tight grasp. Was it disgust, panic, pity, or guilt that I saw on her face? Probably a combination as she quickly came to the awareness that not visiting your mother for years is not a good thing. But I was doing fine. I tried to tell her. I had everything I needed. I had made sure of that.  But her widened eyes and open mouth were not convinced. 

  She screamed obscenities at me. I had never heard her curse before, but I guess we all slide into bad habits as we get older. She held her hands over her heart and acted like she couldn’t breathe. But I should have expected that; she has always been a little melodramatic. I heard her the first time when she yelled “What is wrong with you?” She didn’t have to keep repeating it over and over as she inched into the living room. And, frankly, the answer is “Not a goddamn thing.” If I had known she was coming, I would have cleared it up a little. I really would have. You can’t just show up at someone’s house unexpectedly and assume it will be ready for guests.

  I tried to slide the broken deck chair that I fully intended on fixing, the bag of gently used clothing that I just got from Goodwill, and the almost new cat litter box—for when I eventually get a cat--to the side so she could step over to the couch. But my other treasures were piled so high that they threatened to teeter and collapse on my hysterical daughter.  Nothing ever falls down on me, but I know where to step.  And I forgot that there wasn’t room on the sofa anyway. Most people use their couches for entertaining guests. But I never have guests, so why wouldn’t I use it for another purpose? It makes a great table for sorting my finds from the thrift stores.  Especially since the kitchen table already has plenty to weigh it down.  Each thing I purchase needs just the right spot to call home. I can’t help it if my daughter arrived before I had time to organize the cache from my latest couple of trips. Time has a way of slipping through my fingers, but I thought my riches never would. 

  “We need to talk,” she said. 

  “I’m all ears, dear daughter who I haven’t seen in so long. How have you been?”

  “Fine, I guess. Is there a place we can sit down?”

  “How about outside on the front stoop? I wasn’t expecting anyone, and I usually sit on the side of my bed.”

  “I’m going to try to walk through more of the house first so that I can see everything we are dealing with,” she said after a very heavy, exaggerated sigh.

  “We?”

  “Yes, we. I’m going to get you help. This place has got to be cleaned up.”

  And that’s how it started—the downfall of my independence, the demise of my collection, the loss of my ability to choose.  My worst nightmare. My misguided daughter called in the authorities--something to do with protection of older adults--and my world went spiraling out of control. 

  Now, I will be the first to admit that my house is a bit cluttered. But there is a purpose for everything I save and a reason for every new thing I bring into my home.  I have made it my life’s mission to feel full. The last time I felt empty was when Curtis died. It was an emptiness that ate into my core, hollowed out my heart, and twisted like a serpent in the pit of my stomach. I knew I never wanted to feel that kind of void again. So, two weeks after Curtis left me alone, I went shopping. Big Lots had a sale on Tupperware and I couldn’t resist. Two for one. My garden was just coming in so I thought I would make lots of spaghetti sauce and freeze it for the winter. Maybe some zucchini parmesans too.  I thought I would even use all of that bounty stored in the freezer for Christmas presents. But I just couldn’t muster up the energy to go outside and pick all of those tomatoes and zucchini. So, all of those empty plastic containers waited in silence, poised to serve their purpose in a few large, plastic bags in the corner of the living room. 

  The next bargain I came across was pillows. Cushiony hands that provide softness to a hard world and ease for sore muscles. No one can have too many. I bought them in matching colors for the living room, dining room, bedrooms, and even the kitchen and bathroom. I might have gotten a little too carried away by the sheer number, and of course, I had no clue then that I would need the space for so many other prizes. But that’s hindsight now. It is kind of a shame that they are all buried under other valuables. I’ve even forgotten what color they all are.

  Then there was my craft phase. I suddenly felt like I needed to express myself. I had so much inside me that even I couldn’t identify. I had to have all of the supplies for any creation that wanted to erupt from inside me.  If I could paint a landscape or crochet an afghan, or create a collage made from scraps of yarn or cloth, then I would get some of my feelings out and leave a legacy that someone else might treasure.  Life is all about treasures, isn’t it? People value different things. But, in the end, it’s whatever you value that makes your life richer.

  I felt like my life was rich. I really did. I had clothes in every size, so I never had to go shopping if I lost or gained weight.  The only problem was that there was no more room in the dresser drawers, so my extra attire waited patiently in piles in the dining room.  I had mountains of glassware that yearned to know the lips of visitors—water, wine, sorbet, champagne, cordial, margarita, and martini.  But, of course, the visitors never came.  I had casserole dishes of every width and length, holding tight to the taste of the puddings and pies I never got around to making because I couldn’t find them under the weight of the trash that was ready for the truck that came on Tuesdays. I often forgot what day it was. 

  Time is so valuable. I had to keep track of it better. So, I got a watch. And then it broke, and I got another one. And then I couldn’t find that one and got ten more at the pawn shop just in case I lost the others. They used to be lined up on my bedside table, though none was able to tick off the minutes that it took to collect them. Maybe some of them could be repaired, I kept thinking. But after a while, they too were buried beneath the piles of socks and handkerchiefs and busted cassette players, ipods, transistor radios, headsets, and earbuds that filled the top of the table and overflowed from the drawers. 

  Since I’m getting up in years, I wanted to make sure I kept myself healthy. And I did have my share of aches and pains. So, of course I compiled an array of medications for my myriad ailments…headache, backache, stiffness, swelling, shaking, nausea, convulsing (just in case), cramping, constipation, and my general malaise and anger at the world. I told my daughter I couldn’t help it if the expiration dates spanned the last twenty years. My first aid supplies were comprehensive for so many “just in cases.” I loved those metal cans of band aids so I loaded up on them—you know, the ones with the tiny hinges (now rusted over time), that creak soothingly when pried open, long before the easy flip-top cardboard boxes of today. 

  Sometimes, though, my remedies failed to heal my pain or lift me from the small space I had carved out on my bed. I admit, I did become complacent with a lot of things that should have been discarded. But you never know when you might need something.  Paper towels can be used again. Metal cans, glass bottles, and newspapers have many uses. I’ve heard people say that most of the recycling you put in that blue can and leave by the side of the road gets thrown into the town dump anyway. So, I felt like I was doing my part for the environment. Those kinds of things did seem to get lost under other piles of prizes, but I always felt like I could find them if I needed them. Food doesn’t go bad nearly as quickly as people think and I don’t think I ever got sick from eating food that I had left out because it wouldn’t fit in the refrigerator.  

     Now is the beginning of my nightmare. I panic as my daughter, several donation trucks, and one huge trash receptable creep down the driveway. She doesn’t understand, just like so many others, how the thought of losing my wealth paralyzes me with fright. I will be empty, a void, a shell of the person who once guarded so many treasures.  And those treasures guarded me as well. So, I watch in horror as mountains of slick, black trash bags bloated with mis-sized sweaters, socks, shorts, shoes, shirts, and silky things not worn in years are tossed into the back of the truck... refugees traveling to their new Goodwill home.  Piles of small kitchen appliances, boxes of unread books, and at least forty plastic containers of Christmas decorations, party favors, magazines, and candles are next. 

  I scream, “Please don’t take my stacks of albums… Welk, Williams, Waring, Clancy, and Lennon siblings are waiting to serenade me on my old, but fixable stereo.  

  I know it’s not worth much, but I love that costume jewelry especially that orange brooch and the necklace with a penguin hanging from it and the valentine earrings. 

  That’s the scrapbook of my college days…I need to keep that! And that’s the dress I wore on my first birthday that my mother saved in now yellowed, shredding tissue paper.”

  In the end, I was breathless with panic and heartbroken at losing so much that had been part of me. I did get to keep a few of my treasures, although only the ones I fought hard to keep. At least I didn’t have to battle too hard for my silver, or my china, or my photo albums, or my brittle, waning wedding dress. I was left with only the bare necessities of an empty life—clothes that fit me, dishes that fit into my cupboard, and an empty couch for the visitors that will never come.   My daughter, and the world, for that matter, will never understand that laughter hides in cloth and porcelain, smiles linger in stone, glass and paper, and memories remain alive in the smallest of articles. They will never understand the fear of losing those treasures. There are things, trash to so many, that tie our past to the present, as we limp into the future, afraid of losing everything we have.