I finished off the Parmesan cheese the other day, the Kraft kind with the red double flip top that lets you choose what kind of adventure in cheesiness you would like. I washed the container out and put it in the recycle bin but when I went to toss in the lid as well, my hand wouldn’t let go. I took a closer look at it, then put it in the place where I keep “The Odd Things I Cannot Throw Away”.

Sometimes, such “found” items are just…un-throw-away-able. The box that my husband’s Maui Jim’s sunglasses came in with the cardboard top that looks like real wicker? A good holder for my Post-it notepads. The miniature bottle of Tabasco that accompanied a room-service meal in New York? Now a tiny memory that sits on my bookshelf. The stopper from my Starbuck’s coffee? Strangely interesting and even more impressive in quantity (not unlike the collection of bread bag clips I alluded to in last week’s post.)

After my Mom passed away and we were going through her house, I found an old cookie tin on a shelf in the basement rumpus room that held a magpie’s assortment of saved objects: old board games pieces, some wooden beads and some tiny plastic gewgaws that she had saved. This last category held things that could have easily been thrown away, or recycled, like (wait for it) bread bag clips or the lid from an interesting perfume bottle. My own magpie instincts were modeled to me a long time ago.

What did she see in these tiny bits of ephemera? For her, saving these things was a bit like an eccentric savings account, not unlike my father-in-law’s shop where, with a little bit of thought, he is able to forage out the exact size bolt or screw for an odd job. Odd jobs, after all, require odds things. But the odd things are also sometimes gateways to the weird and wonderful, art projects that are so utterly unique by virtue of the the odds that spawned them.

When I was still in single digits, my Mom created for me a Barbie doll house. Now, this wasn’t a typical doll house that could be carted around and it didn’t live in my bedroom. Instead my Mom commandeered three shelves of the closet in my oldest brother’s basement bedroom – and created a Barbie condo. The bathtub? Carved from a blue fabric softener bottle. The clock on the wall? An old broken wristwatch divorced of its straps. The bed-side lamps? Two plastic pop-tops from cheap champagne. (Take a look next time. You won’t be able to see anything else.)

That Barbie doll house has inhabited my psyche for forty years now. I have so many questions: Did I ask for a Barbie doll house or did Mom get the idea on her own? Was it due to the critical mass of tchotchkes that she had saved up that needed to go somewhere? (Not unlike the patchwork lap blankets she cobbled together for all of us from old polyester sweaters and Fortrel pants.) How did my brother feel about having a Barbie doll house – and his elementary school sister playing – in his bedroom? Did I even like Barbie dolls?

I don’t really remember playing with dolls that much, but I do remember that house. Maybe that’s why I couldn’t throw away that Parmesan cheese top the other day. It would make the perfect Barbie ottoman, with storage for Barbie knitting needles and Barbie yarn, a hobby she’s probably taken up during Covid. Barbie is getting older, after all, just like me. But her condo – in my mind – is still a classic.