When Less Was More

Anyone who knows me these days knows that I have too much stuff.  Too many books, too many clothes, too many gadgets in my kitchen, and the list goes on and on.  Yesterday I was at my parents' old house going through some of my stuff that I haven't seen in at least twenty years.  Some of my stuff that I'd all but forgotten about, but oh, how special it was!  Much more special than many of the things I find myself picking up at Target or Kohl's when I'm shopping.

What particularly caught my eye were my pins.  They were just pins that a girl might stick on the lapel of her Sunday coat, but as I was looking at them, I remembered each of them so clearly.  There's the snowman with the pink hat that had lip gloss inside of it, and there's the little bird in a cage that wiggled a little when you shook it.  There's the pilgrim man and woman that I'd usually wear at Thanksgiving.  And of course a jack-o-lantern for Halloween and a Santa Claus for Christmas.  These pins are made of plastic, but I kept them in my little musical jewelry box with the twirling wind up ballerina inside of it.  I looked at them so, so many times and looked forward to wearing them as the holidays and seasons came around or as the mood presented itself.  There were a few pins from when I was a little older, too.  These were painted metal.  Miss Piggy wearing black fishnet tights and dancing like she was in a Broadway musical revue.  A little ordinary pig, too. I'm not sure what was up with the pigs.   It never would stay latched so I had to be careful to make sure that it didn't fall off my clothing.  I remembered this defect without even examining it.  These pins were among my treasures.

I was suddenly filled with tenderness for the girl that I was.  I treasured the things I had and was not always seeking more.  I always had lots of toys and things growing up, but at some point I accumulated so much "stuff" that it has sometimes become difficult to remember what is really important.    I want to be this girl again.  I want to buy less and purge more.  I want the opportunity to treasure the things that actually mean something to me.