Memory Monday: Treasures to Trash through the Generations

My grandfather and step-grandmother

TREASURES TO TRASH THROUGH THE GENERATIONS

My paternal grandfather lived in his house from the early 1910s until he moved into a nursing home in the late 1970s. There were so many “treasures” in that house, and I inherited three of them— the crystal stemware with matching plates, a bedroom suite, and a gold-upholstered chair. I used to stand next to the china cabinet at my grandparents’ house and make up stories about those dishes (with a family containing five small children, we never had crystal stemware). I was never allowed to open the cabinet and touch anything inside, but I loved it. After my step-grandmother passed away and my grandfather moved in with my parents, my grandfather gave me the crystal. The bedroom suite was always in my grandparents’ bedroom, although it was really the “everything” room since that was where everyone gathered to visit. Kitchen hairs were brought in so the adults had a place to sit while the children sat on the floor or played outside. The bed had tall, slender posts on the corners and all the grandkids swung on them. The dresser was one of those old-fashioned kind (as far as today goes) with the center lower than the drawers on the sides. It had three arched mirrors at the back—two of them hinged to the center one. After my grandfather passed away, my father said I could have that bedroom suite one day.  There was a wing-backed chair in the parlor of my grandparents’ house and my younger sister and I would take turns playing princess with that chair and the sit-down dresser in the front (guest) bedroom. It made for a lot of fun memories.

The years have moved on. The crystal is in its own special cabinet in my kitchen and I will hand it down to my daughter when she get a house. The bedroom suite stayed with my mother after my father died. When she passed, it came to me. My daughter has some memories of it in my mother’s house—she slept in it when she would spend the night there. She wants it for her daughter when she gets old enough to sleep in a full-size bed. That gold “princess” chair was willed to my older sister, but she didn’t care for it, so it stayed at my house. Neither one of my children want it, so I’m not sure what will happen to it after I’m gone.

The lesson I’ve learned from all this is that family “treasures” might only be treasures if there are memories connected to them. I can’t pass my memories to my children, so I can’t expect them to love the things I treasured. But that is only as it should be. They will create new memories and will treasure other things. Hopefully, the things they don’t want will become treasures to others who will create memories of their own and those things will become treasures again in another family.