camillesgraciousliving

Sometimes the simplest objects become the keepers of our greatest love.

For several years after my divorce, I moved often enough that packing became second nature. At times, I felt like a college student changing dorm rooms. Every move required another decision about what was worth carrying and what had to be left behind. 

You learn, eventually, what is important to you and what is worth the effort to actually pack up and move, and what is worth the struggle of letting go.  

And, sometimes that struggle is a very real but necessary decision. 

There were things I left behind simply because I no longer had the emotional bandwidth to carry them. 

One thing that always stayed steady in every move was the three boxes of childhood memories – not my childhood memories, but my children’s. Those three boxes got me through some really dark times. They became a lifeline for my motherhood lost to those very dark days. 

Never, not even once, did I think to toss those memories of those precious times. I probably would have walked on fire to save those memories if I had ever had to. 

“I probably would have walked on fire to save those memories if I had ever had to.”

The boxes contained their early artwork, the outfits that I brought them home in, and photos that I took of them because every second needed to be documented. I didn’t know why I needed all those photos then, but I found out what a comfort they could be over the years. 

I don’t recall how I left without that rocking chair, or maybe I gave it back because one move was just that horrible- I just don’t recall. 

I do recall finding it in the baby furniture store over thirty years ago. It went perfectly with that white wicker crib. 

I remember that first nursery. We were moving soon, and I didn’t do much to decorate. The move was going to take us five states away within six months of James’s birth. 

The crib sat in the room with a chest of drawers and that beautiful wicker rocker. The furniture was white, and the theme was Beatrix Potter. The feeling was just like a new baby – soft and comfortable. 

I am not sure how it escaped me that the rocker made a squeaking noise when you sat in it and rocked. I think that new mom glow masked the squeak, squeak, squeak of the rocking. 

James didn’t like it too much. Even if I got him to sleep as soon as the squeaking stopped, he would wake up. 

This ended up being very frustrating. 

There was a period of time when I was alone with him for several weeks while we were in transition. It had to have been close to midnight when I got him back down.  He was in his crib sleeping – it was a miracle. You know that kind of miracle when that fussy baby who only likes to lie next to you is sleeping in another room. The space it gives a new mom so she can breathe again. Yeah, that kind of small miracle. 

Those were the years when parents were told to let babies cry it out.

Every generation seems to receive different advice, and every generation believes they are doing what is best.

Looking back, I don’t remember the advice nearly as much as I remember loving him.

That rocking chair recently came back to me. It’s worn, and it’s changed colors several times – white, yellow, and now it’s brown. 

But what I see now is all the love that went into rocking one baby at a time. 

When I look at it now, I don’t see worn paint or squeaky joints. I see a young mother who was doing the best she knew how. 

Perhaps that’s what love does.

It leaves itself behind in ordinary things.

A photograph.
A tiny outfit.
Three memory boxes.
An old rocking chair.

We think we’re keeping the objects.

“We think we’re keeping the objects. In truth, they’re keeping pieces of us.”

In truth, they’re keeping pieces of us.

That rocking chair came back to me long after I stopped needing it—but perhaps that was exactly when I was finally ready to understand what it had been holding all along.