My Grandmother’s Trivets
I was talking with a friend who was agonizing over what to do with a bunch of stuff left behind after the passing of her father. The family was in turmoil because they felt it all had sentimental value and didn’t want to get rid of much of it. “Your daughter may one day really want this furniture for sentimental reasons.”
While I understand these sentiments, I think it’s quite possible that most of the stuff was very significant to the person who owned and lived with it, but means much less to the rest of us. This is as it should be.
Dr. Kennedy Shultz used to talk about “Grandmother’s Chest.” He described how families would lug “grandmother’s chest” around from house to house all life long, not actually knowing or caring what was inside. It was just deemed too important or precious to part with. But it really was just taking up space and burdening those who had to keep up with it.
As I try to declutter during the pandemic and clear out my life, I have become aware that many of the things that mean so much to me are only special to me. This is okay. Other things that I no longer am attached to should go and make room for more space or new items.
All of this reminds me of my Grandmother’s trivets. When I was a young boy I loved to visit my grandmother who was always in the kitchen, cooking and talking non-stop. My favorite thing about her house was an entire wall of trivets in her kitchen. Trivets are metal decorative items which are intended to sit hot pots on around the kitchen. My grandparents loved to travel and they had collected trivets from all over the world. These trivets were an endless source of fascination for me, and the wall was literally covered from ceiling to floor with these items.
When it came time for my grandmother to leave her house and move into a smaller apartment, she and her children had the good sense to start to clean out the house and to assign items to the person they were going to. A small sticker was placed on the bottom of clocks or furniture or items that people had requested. I wanted some of the trivets, and I spent a lot of time worrying because I was absolutely sure that everyone else would want them also. Could I get the ones I loved the most? Would I end up in angry conversations as we negotiated over each trivet we cherished?
As it turned out, I was shocked to find that NO ONE else wanted a single trivet but me! This left me to pick the three I loved the most and they have hung proudly in my kitchen ever since, reminding me of my wonderful grandmother who I loved so much and who spent hours cooking and telling stories to her delighted grandson.
By the way, my favorite of the trivets says “Kissin’ Don’t Last, Cookin’ Do.”
Keep things that matter to you, and let the rest go. When I’m gone from this corpus I hope that no one feels burdened to lug around my stuff if they don’t really love it. I miss my grandmother and love the memories brought back by the trivets that I am so happy to still have.
Tim Hinton
November 4, 2021
