The things I cannot throw away

I have a chest of drawers in my mother’s house in Finland.

The piece of furniture belongs to me, as well as everything it contains.

The belongings inside it are a real pick-and-mix, but they do have something in common. They cannot be thrown away, but it also doesn’t make sense to bring them to Spain with me.

So, I have a permanent collection of very personal things living in a different country from me.

We are visiting for the summer holidays, and on the first day I said that I would go over the things to decide what to do with them. A week in, I am no wiser, and the only things I have thrown out are a dried-up primer, a pair of ugly comedy socks, and four of those removable foam cups that go inside a bra.

I want to tell you what is inside these drawers, and why it is so hard to decide what to do with the things in them. The tour of my stuff starts here.

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Top drawer: Cards, such as library cards to various Finnish cities. Keys, some of which I have no idea what door they belong to. Unopened lipsticks in various colours that used to be my shade of choice. Jewellery that I no longer wear, especially silver, as I now only wear yellow gold.

Second drawer: Unopened cosmetics, such as those weird peeling sock things, nail polish, travel shampoo bars, and a Gua Sha roller. Various make-up bags. A little antique box that has sewing supplies, including a really cute sequinned banana iron-on patch.

Third and fourth drawers: Clothes that are hard to classify. There are some “country-style” (meaning very worn) things that I only wear when I am visiting. And then there is a cute antique blouse, a classic white petticoat, and an almost unworn but very uncomfortable pair of Levi’s that I am expecting to get worn in. And there are clothes that I have made by hand, some knitted, some crocheted.

Fifth drawer: A folder full of important papers, old bank statements, and paperwork from past apartments, jobs and qualifications. A bag of electronics, including an old iPhone and some adapters. A bag of “nice office supplies”, like a really good Stanley knife (if you have used one, you know they are not all the same) and pencils.

Sixth drawer: My art school portfolio, including both photographs and slides of the work I did during my BA (yes, we were told to get slides made; this tells you how long it has been). Magazines that have my first published pieces or a mention of one of my art shows. Yearbooks from school. A bag of mementoes, such as birthday cards, festival tickets, pieces of paper with random phone numbers (not going to lie, they are probably from boys), invitations to the wildest house party we ever organised with my then best friend.

So why can I not throw this stuff away, sell it or take it to Spain with me? The last one is easiest to answer. I do not use this stuff regularly, and when we travel, we have limited luggage space as well as limited storage at home.

But to get rid of it… A harder question to answer.

I can give you mundane responses. The lipsticks or office supplies might come in handy. The jewellery was expensive to buy. I might still wear some of the clothes. The mementoes are a fun thing to leaf through sometimes.

Maybe the taxman wants to see a bank statement from 2012 one day. I could be visiting one of the cities I have a library card for. The knitted sweater literally took hundreds of hours to make, and I am not ready for the sunk cost reality.

But there is another answer why it is these things, and not something else, that have survived several moves and lifestyle changes over the past couple of years.

It is because they are no longer just possessions. They have become identities.

I think this exact accumulation of things holds all the different versions I have been: the art student, the artist, the journalist, the party girl, the knitter, the reader, the one who wore red lipstick and loved vintage clothes, the one who wrote letters, listened to weird bands, and sharpened her pencils with a really good knife.

The one who fell in and out of love, started and ended friendships.

In the drawers you can find the girl who had her first job, and wrote her first published piece, and held her first art show, rented her first and then bought her first apartment, who got a driver’s license and then never used it. You can find the girl who did her BA and her MA abroad, and came back as a fully grown woman and worked so so so hard in several ad agencies.

You can still find the girl who felt pretty and ugly, and happy and sad.

In these objects there is still a little possibility, like a tiny door to walk through. A chance to visit those past versions of me, to never forget I was those girls too. To have someone quietly whisper in my ear, “Do you remember the time when…”

I know all these versions of me still exist inside me. I don’t technically need reminders or proof. I don’t need to build a museum or a cabinet of curiosities. My memory still works fine.

Perhaps I’m just wrong in treating these objects as if they belonged to me, when in fact they belong to someone else entirely.

And it is wrong to throw out something that doesn’t really belong to me. The me of now, the mother of a toddler, the freelancing writer, the partner of a Valencian living in Spain.

These objects belong to those other girls and women, who are me, but at the same time are not. They are not mine to throw out. They are not my decision anymore, or maybe not yet.

So, I am sorry, Mom. I guess these things will stay here for now. Maybe I will take one of the lipsticks with me, though. I am thinking of becoming a lipstick wearer again.

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Choose one item that you do not regularly use and feel was a part of the life of a past you. Use it for one day.

Put on that lucky dress, read the book that was your favourite as a child, write with the pen you used when you were studying. See how your past and present yous are shaking hands.

Wishing you lots of love and light from the Haus of Weis, Aurinna

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