In my 6th grade Spanish class, we spoke dorky dialogues from the text after listening to them on cassettes, and I remember only this one:
?Que esta en la bolsa?
asks the girl of the boy holding a paper lunch sack.
Es una culebra,
he answers.
With no further explaination. Or maybe my brain got stuck on sentence two and I can't remember. But, who carries a freaking snake in a lunch bag?
Was it a bad joke? Was he a future serial killer?
Was the textbook company fucking with little minds?
I guess I'll never know.
But for the rest of my life, when I see a bag my brain asks what's in it, in espanol, a little OCD quirk.
But guess what? We can play ?Que esta in Mel's bolsa?
It won't be a reptile, that's for sure. It's not a chicken either, though I love this close approximation to a Delaware game cock. I was raised a first stater, graduated UD, go fightin' Blue Hens! and I have a wee fascination with all things chicken, since I grew up in the land of chicken farms, had many a chicken pet, including my favorite, bantums with chicks, teeny tiny chickens!, and my sister's chicken Lucky, who fell off the chicken truck, who was, as it turns out, poorly named. Oops, chicken tangent. Anyway.
So...
?Que esta en la bolsa?
Well, it's these. I need them. All in one place.
Handy.
Es mi libros.
? Que esta in los libros?
What's spanish for my life, my stories, my manic journals? Notebooks? Therapy and conversations with myself?Can you guess which is which?
One's from high school, mid 70's, still in use for logging important data like the list of every book I've read since about middle school, flight logs, kid quotes, safety tips, or deep thoughts. Life stuff.
Ones from 1983, a chronicling of all the events and milestones since college, meeting my husband, starting a family, pets and kids and travels. Kept faithfully for 27 years and current.
One's a really lame fiction story I started, and am now forever stuck.
One's the cancer book. On hold.
One's the daily phone crap, Dr. appt. reminders, miscellany. Full.
One's a journal from 2 years of parenting and thinking. Material.
One's a journal of quotes I copy from books I read. To reread. Again.
One is a nature journal and some sketches from our vacation home in the hills. Kindof lame, especially my sketching.
One is just random notes, things to do, another is lists of fun things to do, places to go, adventures to take with the kids.
I am nothing without facts, data, lists and words. I am my scribe.
But wait there's more, just not in the bag.
I don't keep en mi bolsa my 3 ring binder of all the loose stuff, lists like every movie I've ever watched, books I need to read, and stories I write and memories I catch, or pages of collected family stories. It's too big and would tear the chicken bag. But I wish it fit, then everything I'd grab in a fire would be in one place.
The binder is just too full. Everything in here is important life stuff. To me.
Mi piquito famlia on the cover, and hundreds of rabbit holes inside. Want to hop down one?
What's inside that letter?
A note I wrote to myself last year to help me remember....
this.
One of the odder coincidences in my life. My sick mom is in the hospital getting chemo, breast cancer, round two, Dad dying. I fly from IL to DEL for the umpteenth time, which drains me, even in good times, and this was not a good time. Mom asked me to make her bed, which is overwhelming because she hoards and everything is so hard to do. I try not to drip tears on her sheets, and decide to chip away at safe footing around the bed and begin to sort through piles of junk mail, newspapers, papers, stuff and I find the evelope with the butterfly and for some reason look inside, and there is this little piece of me I gave to her, this letter I wrote about making her bed because I love her and Dad, and a drawing of her cluttered bedroom in my childhood home. I even drew piles of clothes then, and I was sad now from crawling over the piles of clothes 30 years in the future, where she surrounds herself with bits from her past, just like I do now. I cried some strange tears and laughed some, too. At least I made the bed, because I didn't get much else done that night.
Life is really strange sometimes. I think that note found me.
ps I can make a box. I just learned.
I was so proud. I made a few of them just to prove it.
The mom in me was so proud of the young me.
Sometimes I wish I could time travel just so I could go back and comfort that child, steer her clear, spare her some things, make sure she remembered all the good things, because I really wish I had all those memories now.
I kept the letter. I never told mom I found it or that I took it, and I don't think she knew it was there anymore. So now it's part of my piles of papers.
How can I not keep the reminders (remainders?) of my odd life? Aren't they treasure somehow? Or proof? I'm trying not to worry about the hoarding aspect of this, I figure I'm maybe a level two right now, and realization is the first step to recovery, right? And everything is neatly, compulsively stashed in cute little notebooks and bags. It soothes me to put things in things, away.
Maybe we'll play more ?Que esta in something else full of pieces of me.
I got stuff stashed Everywhere.
Oooh, remind me sometime to tell you about the letter my grandma emily wrote that my daughter emily made me find. More Wabi-Sabi serendipitous weirdness. Until then,
Hasta luego, mi amigas.
Muchas gracias.
Oh - and
?Que esta in tu bolsas?
(Whats in your bags?)
That's all just beautiful. x
ReplyDeleteI worked in text book publishing. They were fucking with little minds, trust me.
ReplyDeleteLove you,
SB.
I forgot to add that I don't carry a purse. I am more of a purger than a hoarder, except that I do collect cats. I have 7 of them and a dog. I may need a cat intervention.
ReplyDeleteActually, many times, I throw something out in the name of simplifying, and have to go buy it again the next week.
That anybody read this means more than you can know. And I'm glad my suspicions about the publisher were correct! Thanks! And you don't need a cat intervention until you have way more, trust me. My best irl buddy is a cat rescue lady and she keeps the unadoptables and the occasional amazing one, and sometimes there are bitty babies that need bottles at all hours. I don't think she's crazy, so I'm sure you're not. Just big hearted.
ReplyDeleteThat was just a precious post. I think we write ourselves letters all the time and I think the death of "real" letters is a huge tragedy. I love that you carry so many journals around with you. So beautiful to have them all and I'll bet you have some favorite pens, too...
ReplyDeleteWhat's in my bag? A bunch of crap. But I love my bags and love switching out bags. I think it has something to do with fondling the leather. I like squishy leather bags what are bag-like, not structured.
But that's one of my weaknesses- the squishy leather handbag.
Another one knocked outta the park. :) Lady, you blog good.
ReplyDeleteI am an erratic keeper of things. I will stash and stash, and then have a huge attack of feng shui and throw everything away. I feel better, the less stuff I have (my mom also has hoarding tendencies, makes me scared of that path), but in my minimalistic fits I often end up losing things I regret not holding onto. So there isn't much in my bag (no snakes at least! lol). I do have a box somewhere in the basement filled with a strange assortment of childhood stuff and clothes. Clothes I have the hardest time letting go of. I think of who and where I was when I wore it and just can't let it go.
Oh what an amazing post. I LOVED LOVED LOVED this. The whole bag memory was perfect. And you made me laugh when you said "chicken tangent." I love your notebooks and what's in them, seeing them lined up there. Thanks for sharing and how odd and yes wabi sabi amazing that you found that letter! I thought I was reading it wrong at first, how can this be true? Finding a letter about making the bed, while making the bed? And in a place that is piles with every little thing. Wow.
ReplyDeleteGosh, that much be hard to have on you, the hoarding history, the burden of such a thing. Overwhelming. I'm so glad your little self was speaking to your adult self, helping you through it.
I have to comment on the SB's cat hoarding thing. I know you guys all know this. But animal hoarders are NOT people that have lots of animals, but people that do not care for and clean up after these animals properly, AND most often they are letting them reproduce. Animal rescue people are in an entirely different class.
As for what's in my bag, well, I have my "therapy" writings in a black bag near my bed. The rabbit has chewed holes in that bag. I finally, just this weekend found another bag to stash them in, a bag with a painting of an orange cat actually. As I was shoving the papers and notebooks into the new bag, I read some bits and pieces and thought, oh these are the writings of a mad woman.
But whatever, it's okay.
Thanks for writing all this.
You are a gem.
Ms. Moon, you are so wise and kind, and there is nothing quite like a letter, or a nice soft leather bag!
ReplyDeleteE, thanks, and boy howdy do I struggle with the clothes thing. My sister saw me on video chat last month wearing a shirt she handed down to me and she said throw that ugly 25 year old shirt away right now! So I goodwilled it. I throw very little in the actual trash. I get an actual buzz from consolidating things and tidying, but I'm also a keeper. Double edged sword, being the child of a hoarder.
Bethany, thank you! My little notebooks make me feel safe, and I like the look of them lined up too. I didn't know why I was taking the pictures at the time, I was just feeling crazy. I know what you mean about pet hoarders - I watch all those shows. It's when you stop caring for them that it becomes sickness. I watch that hoarder show on A&E which is why I throw around the level ratings like I know what I'm talking about. Those people need shovels to clean a room and they always find dead things under the pile. Thankfully we are not there. But still scary.
I'm beginning to think that the crazy people are the ones that don't write things down. We're all looking more normal to me every day. Isn't it odd how happy a themed bag full of your stuff can make you?
mom, do you want me to make your bed for you? :)
ReplyDeleteHa ha, sweetie, you know I don't care if my bed is made! Love you!
ReplyDeleteAs soon as I read about the letter I thought "it has been patiently waiting for you and now it finally found you!". Time traveling. So simple and yet so ignored by most people. Touching across times, reliving what once was, you wrote it and now you read it. What happened in between these two actions? So many things you may remember, so many things you may forgot. But this is here, now, held by the same hand that once made it come alive. There are no coincidences, just episodes in time and out of time.
ReplyDeleteI too hoard, components for my jewelry and odd things for my art. I tell myself I will have to be reasonable and distashed some of the things that sleep perfectly aligned in my studio drawers or at least live another 64 years to used them if I start today without stop. Yet every time I try, I pack them back again. Oh I use them alright, but I cannot use the last ones, or the ones that are only a few of. They have been with me for a long time, I admire their form, their color, the gracious workmanship that took time of someone's life to create. Would they be loved if I let them go? It sounds so crazy, and yet I do think that.
Que tengo en my bolsa? muchas cosas, tantas que es mejor no empezar a contarlas!
Hugs to you my sweet Mel. This was a wonderful, heart rendering and heart revealing post.
Oh Allegra, thank you so much for stopping by and for leaving such a nice comment. I know what you mean, I have some precious beads from my jewelry making in my teens and I can't use them either! It's strange, isn't it, the holding on we are compelled to do sometimes.
ReplyDeleteI wish my spanish was good enough to translate what is in your bolsa, I'm going to google a translator right now. Hugs to you too.