I've always said I wasn't very sentimental.....and for the most part, that's probably true. However, the older I get and the more friends and families I see losing loved ones, the more I find myself thinking twice about what I have that someone else "may" want, rather than me selling it. I'm not really sure how I started thinking about all this, but I know it hit home when I read someone's blog not long ago about how many people are melting down all their gold just to get the money....money that will be gone before they can turn around, and for a lot of folks, money they won't even be able to account for. Of course, I realize there are people in desperate situations, so I do not want to sound like I am passing judgement....it just made me start thinking about past events, and what happened to some items I might have wanted to keep.

I was in junior high school when my grandma's house burned in Big Sandy, Tennessee. I've slept many times since then, but I still have some very vivid memories of that house and some of the treasures within. As one of four children, the majority of vacations we took were to see relatives near and far, but we went to Grandma Pattoe's house often! My dad would just decide on the spur of the moment that we would go for a couple of nights, and off we'd go...many times at night, and we would arrive after she was already in bed. Grandma was deaf, but somehow, when Daddy's feet would hit the front porch and he'd knock on the window.....she'd know it was "Babe" as she always called him.(Can you imagine in this day and age of deadbolts and alarm systems, what you'd do if someone started banging on your bedroom window?!) We'd all haul out of the car and the fun would begin....so much for her getting to bed at a decent hour!

It seemed like no matter when we went to visit, she would have just made fried apple pies and chocolate pies, and they really were kept in the Pie Safe! It wasn't just a piece of primitive furniture....it really had a use! Depression glass green bowls weren't just to look pretty.....we really did eat our breakfast oatmeal in them.....(Sounds like all my memories are of food, doesn't it!)Hmmmm.....She really used those graniteware dippers to get water out of the cistern.....really did fry her chicken in those huge cast iron skillets......really did make fresh iced tea and put it in that tilt Ball clear pitcher.....

We looked through all of her pictures a hundred times or more.....in those great book albums with the decorative covers....We slept in the pull down Murphy bed sometimes in one of the front rooms....I was always afraid it would fold up with me in there. There was no danger of ever being cold, because with the feather bed comforters she had made and stuffed herself, and piles of hand-pieced, hand stitched quilts...we were plenty warm!

Unlike some of the homes around her that were modernized, she still had outdoor facilities! But there were also graniteware and ironstone chamber pots underneath the beds so we didn't have to brave the elements....The next morning, she would heat water on her cast iron wood stove....and yes, it really did have wood that you put under those lift off burners to cook with.....and then she would pour it into great big galvanized wash pans(our bathtubs) on the back side of that wrap around porch! We'd swing on the front porch swing, sit in the antique adirondack chairs, set our drinks on the twig table, and have the time of our lives listening to her tell stories...plus, she laughed at everything we said and thought we were the berries......the feeling was mutual of course!

This is just the tip of the iceberg as far as remembering some of the things that were in her home......When it burned to the ground.....we lost a lot, but nothing to compare with what Grandma did....My sister has always been the queen of sentiment......so she's often talked about pictures, books, family records, etc....that she'd love to have from there.....My family built another house for her, and although she continued making memories for us in that new place....it was never quite the same....A part of Grandma died with those flames, as I suspect is the same with lots of folks who lose their homes to fire.

I try to never take one day for granted any more....and to remember to be grateful for good health and a sound mind! If you have items that you know someone might enjoy....and you really don't want them any more, consider giving them away. You get the pleasure.....someone else gets the treasure! I know, I know....now I sound like a sentimental slob....perhaps it just "comes" with age!

Marsha Beaton from The Loft Antiques

http://theloftantiques.rubylane.com