When objects become lighter than memory
The purge and the second nest.
Spirits live quietly alongside us. Not as slips of shadows or flashes of light, but as something far more ordinary etched into objects. If you’re anything like me, you hold onto them out of guilt. It feels like betrayal, or worse. An erasure, as if dumping a trinket charged with memories would make them disappear.
I held onto a plastic Star Trek toy that held no particular meaning except that it was the only thing that was returned to me by his workplace when my brother ended his life. Kept it in a drawer for ten years because I had so few things that belonged to him. Finally, last year I threw it away.
I hated the thought of releasing it to languish unceremoniously somewhere in a landfill. Surely, the memory of a loved one deserves better than that?
How do we know when we’re ready to part with these anchors of memory and time? Why do some objects become less of a portal and slowly return to just being objects again? I’m curious why the emotional charge of a memory weakens in these inanimate objects made of cloth, plastic, metal, or wood. Whether for closure, a new chapter, or a transfer of memory, there comes a time when we no longer need these vessels for the ones we internalize.