Pockets

[janradder]

Downstairs in the basement, next the washing machine and dryer, is a table that is covered with rocks, string, stickers, strips of paper, puzzle pieces, small toys, broken pieces of plastic, plastic coins, parts to superheroes, and small sticks. I found each of these objects at the bottom of my sons' pants pockets as I searched through them before tossing them into the washer.

Over the past year, the collection has grown, and though Arie now refuses to go to the basement because it has spiders in it so he has not seen it, Éiden has, but he never asks about it. Nor does he sort through the collection in search of the lost bits of ephemera from his life. I wonder if either of them ever remember shoving those things into their pockets, or if they even notice that they are missing.

Yesterday, after he got dressed, Éiden reached down into his pockets and pulled out two plastic snakes that I'd missed when I'd last done the laundry.

"Look!" he shouted, grinning from ear to ear and holding the snakes aloft in the air. "The snakes went through the wash!"

Then off he walked, playing with the snakes as if they were the most wonderful toys in the world, prized possessions to be treasured and loved, and the very things he'd been looking for his whole life just to make it complete.

Comments

[janradder.livejournal.com]

I think you may be right about the sticks -- I've never come across any of those post-wash. Rocks on the other hand -- oy vey! I could start a business selling landscaping gravel with the number rocks I've pulled out of the washing machine.