Things You Keep
Some things you
keep. Like good teeth. Warm coats. Bald husbands.
They're good for you, reliable and practical and so sublime that to throw them away would
make the garbage man a thief. So you hang on, because something old is sometimes better
than something new, and what you know is often better than a stranger.
These are my thoughts, they make me sound old, old and tame, and dull at a time when
everybody else is risky and racy and flashing all that's new and improved in their lives.
New careers, new thighs, new lips, new cars. The world is dizzy with trade-ins. I could
keep track, but I don't think I want to.
I grew up with practical parents - a mother, God bless her, who washed aluminum foil after
she cooked in it, then reused it -and still does. A father who was happier getting old
shoes fixed than buying new ones.
They weren't poor, my parents, they were just satisfied. Their marriage was good, their
dreams focused. Their best friends lived barely a wave away.
I can see them now, Daddy in trousers and tee shirt and Mother in a house dress, lawn
mower in his hand, dishtowel in hers. It was a time for fixing things - a curtain rod, the
kitchen radio, screen door, the oven door, the hem in a dress. Things you keep. It was a
way of life, and sometimes it made me crazy. All that re-fixing, reheating, renewing, I
wanted just once to be wasteful. Waste meant affluence. Throwing things away meant there'd
always be more.
But then my Daddy died, and on that clear winter night, in the chill of his room, I was
struck with the pain of learning that sometimes there isn't any 'more.' Sometimes what you
care about most gets all used up and goes away, never to return.
So, while you have it, it's best to love it and care for it and fix it when it's broken
and heal it when it's sick. That's true for marriage and old cars and children with bad
report cards and dogs with bad hips and aging parents. You keep them because they're worth
it, because you're worth it.
Some things you keep. Like a best friend that moved away or a classmate you grew up with,
there's just some things that make life important...people you know are special...and you
KEEP them close!