StoryWorth: Keepsakes
Do you have any keepsakes or heirlooms from your father?
Goodness, so many! I have tried to pare down and get rid of most of my parents’ things, but it’s an ongoing process. I have documents and photos of my father’s entire life in surprising detail, even after three months of paring down all the letters, papers, photographs, etc. There are two belt buckles with Liberty dollars from the year Dad was born that seem, on the one hand, like I could easily let them go, but on the other hand like something that would have no meaning to almost anyone else and don’t have much value in themselves.
The one thing that I really take joy in is a nondescript gray sweater of my dad’s. It fits me pretty well and is super warm and comfortable, with a high neck, so it makes a great extra layer on very cold days. I always enjoyed snagging my dad’s clothes-more than my mom’s, which rarely fit me-and it’s nice to feel as though he’s still keeping me warm.
But the thing that I think of as my real treasure from my dad is not the material things that I can touch, or read, or look at. It’s the things that I learned from witnessing his work and talking with him through forty-two wonderful years. He taught me how to hold an interesting conversation, how to tell a story-which I’m actually much better at than he ever was-how to lead groups, how to be self-confident. He thought I was an amazing person-”How did you get so wise,” he once asked me-and that joy in my self is the enduring legacy that I hold.One of my therapists once said that no matter how far down she drilled, there was always a sense of self-worth, a knowledge that I am loved and worthy of love. If you asked me about my father’s flaws I could go on at least this long, but his gift to me was that enduring belief that someone has always loved me. That’s my dad.
This entry was originally posted at https://lillibet.dreamwidth.org/1313881.html. You can comment either place! There are
comments over there now.
Goodness, so many! I have tried to pare down and get rid of most of my parents’ things, but it’s an ongoing process. I have documents and photos of my father’s entire life in surprising detail, even after three months of paring down all the letters, papers, photographs, etc. There are two belt buckles with Liberty dollars from the year Dad was born that seem, on the one hand, like I could easily let them go, but on the other hand like something that would have no meaning to almost anyone else and don’t have much value in themselves.
The one thing that I really take joy in is a nondescript gray sweater of my dad’s. It fits me pretty well and is super warm and comfortable, with a high neck, so it makes a great extra layer on very cold days. I always enjoyed snagging my dad’s clothes-more than my mom’s, which rarely fit me-and it’s nice to feel as though he’s still keeping me warm.
But the thing that I think of as my real treasure from my dad is not the material things that I can touch, or read, or look at. It’s the things that I learned from witnessing his work and talking with him through forty-two wonderful years. He taught me how to hold an interesting conversation, how to tell a story-which I’m actually much better at than he ever was-how to lead groups, how to be self-confident. He thought I was an amazing person-”How did you get so wise,” he once asked me-and that joy in my self is the enduring legacy that I hold.One of my therapists once said that no matter how far down she drilled, there was always a sense of self-worth, a knowledge that I am loved and worthy of love. If you asked me about my father’s flaws I could go on at least this long, but his gift to me was that enduring belief that someone has always loved me. That’s my dad.
This entry was originally posted at https://lillibet.dreamwidth.org/1313881.html. You can comment either place! There are
comments over there now.