little things

In the past couple months I've gone through all of my belongings, and thrown out at least half.  In some ways it's an attempt to uproot myself, to be ready for the next adventure.  My new rule: throw away everything that doesn't have a story.

There's the matchbook from Silverlake Cha Cha lounge last summer, my grandfather's handmade cherry-stained wood boxes, sand in a bottle from a peak overlooking Uluru...far enough away from the sacred site I think, to not be cursed.  There's a decorative plate that the waiter (my first admirer) at Little India Restaurant in Waltham gave to me when I was fourteen---

Here are a few more:

These guys are little clay things...and yes, the toadstool is quite as alive as the gnome.  What's so magical about them is they were given to me, years apart, by two of the most amazing people I have ever met, and somehow, they completely belong together.
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 Bundaberg is known for its sarsaparilla soda...or maybe more so, it's rum.  It's located somewhere up the eastern coast of Australia, just about as far away from any place you'd want to be, that is, if you don't want to be laying on a sunny Aussie beach drinking rum and getting a nice crimson sun-tan.  None of this occurred to me when my traveling man and I rolled in around 4pm on a Friday, just as the banks closed, with a quarter tank of gas, twenty bucks in cash, and a cooler full of fresh veggies.  For some reason Bundaberg incited a deep dread in the bottom of our stomachs.  Maybe it was that I'd just lost my wallet, and now our only chance of getting cash was pleading with a bank teller to withdraw money with my passport...a chance that was three nights away.  We couldn't wait around.  There was a desolate pull in the clean but empty street, and it felt like if we were here more than a few hours we'd be sucked in and never leave.  We put our last twenty in the gas tank and crossed our finger that we'd make up to the next tiny town.  It sounds absurd, but a week later I met an amazing young Swedish woman who had abandoned her home and world travels to live in Bundaburg...I never quite found out why.             
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There is a kingdom in the woods of my childhood romping grounds.  There are obstacles: a gigantica fall tree balance beam called The Poison Ivy Challenge, the deadly sink-mud---and there are places of magical powers---Bubbling Brook Crossing, and The Forsythia Hideout.  These drawing are blueprints for our tree-house village.

Much thanks to this book.  Note especially the comedy of the "do not do" section.
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