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Mom's treasurers were piled up all over her home ... lining the walls, shelves, tops of dressers and spilling off of coffee tables.
I called these cheap china figurines "MomJunk."
In the end, the MomJunk was the highlight of her memorial service.
To Mom, the MomJunk were her treasures. She had collected -- or received as gifts -- dozens of china figurines over 70 years. Most were garish and cheap looking.
I hated'em.
As a clean freak, MomJunk cluttered up and stifled our tiny family home. To my adolescent eyes, they represented everything ugly and common-place about my midwestern home.
As maturity slowly descended upon me, MomJunk changed. These figurines were talismans to Mom, to comfort her with familiarity as the world changed around her. Her husband became bend and frail. MS robbed Mom of her strength, forcing her onto disability and retirement. Finally, circumstances forced her out the family home and away from her beloved siblings and extended family. No wonder she clung to these little figurines as the world spun out of control.
Many of the MomJunk were actually gifts from the nursing home residents that Mom had cared for. Her "little old ladies" had loved Mom and her gentle, kind attitude toward tending to the elderly in nursing homes. Each piece of MomJunk was a reminder about the joy and fulfilment she had gained with eldercare.
Transporting the MomJunk was a nightmare for me and my brother. Mom's MS had advanced so much that we had to move her close to us, to an Arizona suburb. We carefully wrapped each figurine in newspapers, then installed them in a huge curio cabinet that was purchased to store the MomJunk.
Too soon, Mom had to leave her figurines behind when she moved into a nursing home. After her death, we shipped a suitcase full of figurines back to Indiana for her memorial service. At the memorial service, we decorated a display table with MomJunk and photos of Mom and her sister.
In the photo, the two women's faces shine in the sun; their appled round cheeks are plump as they smile into the camera. Behind them, a stack of MomJunk rises into the hair. I took the photo as Mom and Auntie sat in the garage and supervised the packing of the MomJunk. Auntie was almost identical to Mom; they were almost a year apart in age. Mom talked at length about every figurine as it was packed away; Auntie nodded and listened as Mom spun stories about her "little old ladies."
At the service, I gave away the framed photos to my extended family, and everyone was invited to take home a little bit of the MomJunk. My four year old niece carefully selected out a yellow canary figurine. Mom would have been pleased, I know. She is in heaven, keeping company with Auntie and her little old ladies, surrounded by her beloved MomJunk.
