Signs that Your Mother Was a Hoarder
Cigarette butts and the ash of Salem Lights in never-emptied
glass ashtrays. Crumpled take-out paper bags from Wendy’s piled
next to the couch. Mold growing on the pink rubber mat
in the bathtub. Cardigans, size M, in heather, taupe, and buttery yellow
with mother-of-pearl buttons heaped on the dresser. A letter
dated 1967 from a newly married friend tucked away in a drawer.
Paper and plastic bags packed with unopened groceries
picked up just because they were on sale
down at the Stop n’ Shop: crackers, grape juice,
garbage bags, detergent. Childhood photographs fallen
from albums. Recipe books splattered with pasta sauce
and bacon grease. A green Singer sewing machine bearing
a tangled spool of navy thread. Rotting food
on dishes in the sink. Cobwebs.
Still-soaked storage containers from the flood of last year’s
hurricane. A Polaroid camera in its canvas case. An engraving
machine with tiles reading “Shuneka Harrison,” my sister’s best
childhood friend, in the font tray. Spiders’ egg sacs dangling
from ceiling corners. Family videos on microfilm. Receipts
for child support for a boy named Donnie we’ve never
heard of before. The smell of cat urine. Four eyebrow curlers.
Boxes of shoes that have never been worn. Shoes that have the soles
worn through. Ziplocked packages of meat long expired
in the basement freezer. Every cancelled check ever written
for mortgage, taxes, cable T. V., and the lawnmower man. A child’s
red plastic barrette. One thousand nine Harlequin romance novels
in dusty paper shopping bags. The skeleton
of a small animal. A rusty projector.
Flies that avoid the sticky-tape traps that have been set
for them. Rolled-up half-used tubes of Denture Grip. Hundreds
of dollars in loose change. A white leather jewelry box containing
the baby teeth we left for the Tooth Fairy in exchange
for a quarter. Empty prescription pill bottles for high
blood pressure. A tube of MAC coral lipstick.
A stray ketchup packet that has exploded onto the wall. Piles
of department store clothes, most with tags. The exoskeletons
of insects. Mesh laundry bags filled with nude-colored
Maidenform bras. A Newport High School yearbook stuffed
with autographed picture cards. Bags of polyester shirts
that my father wore before he died. Rusted curling irons
and a burnt-out blowdryer.
Sweaters that smell like Bath and Body Works’ vanilla-sugar
lotion. Depends Undergarments. Handwritten recipes in elegant
script. A manila envelope containing our elementary school
report cards. A silver hoop earring without its mate.
When the dumpsters are full and the floors are bare,
it no longer feels like home.
Christine Taylor resides in her hometown Plainfield, New Jersey, and is an English teacher and part-time librarian at a local independent school and the mother of several poorly behaved cats (and a couple dogs). Her previously published work appears in PeaceCorpsWriters and Modern Haiku.
