Mementos

For the past month I have been working my way through a book called Getting Things Done. It has been an instigator for doing some things I always intend to do, but can never focus on for long enough to actually write them down and then do them. One of my tasks for today was to measure some of my old sheet music and photos in order to frame them, and while seeking these out I came across a pile of mementos I've kept. There were some pictures of people I had dated, a couple of old letters, and then underneath the papers were these things:

The bottom of a plastic champagne glass from a past New Year's Eve
A purple plastic Lei from that same night
A mixed tape an old girlfriend made when I moved from Texas to L.A.
A large dried leaf that dropped onto the patio table during my first date with a man
A blue collar from my cat Ira, with his tag
A green collar from Ira with his rabies vaccination tag
An antique stopwatch and blue cloth case
A plastic pangolin
A baby picture of Z.M. Madsen
A little orange cloth heart
A green rubber bracelet from the publication date of one of the Harry Potter books
An orange rubber bracelet from a production of Annie
A piece of pink plastic cut like a jewel
A small bowl crafted from a gourd, with a beaded interior
A handmade button with a puff paint snowman

It's funny because some of the things I've kept seem to have little significance now, and then some I will keep simply to remember people and animals past, even though the items themselves are of little significance. They all stir up emotions and make my mind wander back to the past, and the way things shook out.

Like that leaf? When it fell the guy I was with, an over earnest slam poet named Ted, mentioned that it must be a sign, and when he wasn't looking, I slipped it in my pants pocket. That night we ended up on the beach kissing, getting sand in our hair and under our shirts. I felt things for him that I just hadn't before, and from that moment on I knew I couldn't deny that my attraction to men was far more than the merely physical thing I had been trying to pigeon hole it as.

The cat collars make me think of my sweet cat Ira that I had with me for more than 18 years, through six moves, multiple roommates, and through countless nights of him yowling like a little old man to get food, attention, or to be let outside.

They all leave me with a slight sense of melancholy, which is probably why people don't often go through their mementos. And while I'm glad I did sift through mine for a bit, it's time to slip that little painted box back under the bed for a while.