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The title for this morning’s writings might need some finetuning but I won’t dwell on that right now. I awoke this morning before the sun was up with thoughts running through my head of family history and trinkets and memorabilia in particular. You see, I sat in on our Society’s Web Wednesday last night with a theme of just that. I had pondered the thought beforehand but the only “trinket” I could bring to mind was my father’s wedding band. My parents split up early in my life and my father ended up remarried and when he passed, my sister from that second marriage chose to send that wedding band to me. How thoughtful. That band meant a lot to me and my husband currently wears it as his own wedding band no longer fit over his knuckles. Its significance feels all the stronger because I had always thought one day I would have my mother’s wedding ring set from that marriage to my father (or my brother and I would share it) but that ring set went missing from my mother’s apartment where she managed in the West End of Vancouver. At least that is my recollection.

As I listened to other members’ “shares” on last night’s theme I realized there are a few other trinkets in this house. We have a bracelet that is small like a child’s with the name Florida. We assume this is my husband’s grandmother’s but do not know for certain with his mother gone and all her siblings. The bracelet is small — was it hers as a child, perhaps a gift from a godparent or a tradition in her family?

I also recalled other items that we still have — a couple pieces of the dish set my parents had when they were first married — a gift for their wedding or purchased together early on. Over the years most pieces were gone but today I have a few pieces and a few years back I gave a couple pieces to my brother with some cookies (one of the recipes my mother baked) and a copy of that recipe card in mom’s handwriting. When my grandmother on my mother’s side passed away some of her stuff was brought to a family reunion and put out for attendees to take if they were interested. I felt awkward as I had not grown up with my grandparents nearby. I never met that grandfather and only met my grandmother maybe three times that I can recall and not while I was a child. I did end up taking one or two things — a poncho she had worn and a bangly piece of jewelry which I took a piece of it and created an ornament that goes on our Christmas tree. Its significance not lost on me but as I write I am not certain my children would know its significance. There are other memorabilia of earlier parts of our lives and a bit from my parents but, all in all, pretty limited.

That meeting last night, though, also sent me off on a tangent, thinking past memorabilia and physical things, about my mother and what prompted her to be so far apart from her parents and family for most of her adult life. Why did she not stay in Alberta where her parents and pretty much all her siblings lived most of their lives? The answer I came up with — LOVE. She met my father and they moved often, following where he could find work. I ponder the similarities in my mother’s life and that of my own. Much as my early adult life was spent moving around and being physically apart from my mother and brother, my family, due to my husband’s work.