1. What Was Your Most Precious Childhood Possession?

     "It doesn't matter. Your dad will just buy you another one," she spat at me. And those words have stuck with me these twenty-some years. 

     There was a small part of my childhood when I was completely and utterly spoiled. My parents were recently divorced, I was in early elementary school, and even though my father had never graduated from college, the prosperous 90s had landed him as manager of quality control at the paper mill he had worked nights for throughout my infancy.  I had always known deep in my gut were weren't rich people, and even then it seemed like a reprieve having more than enough to be comfortable and a second room for my stuffed animals. 

   Frances and I were playing with said stuffed animals one afternoon in my play room. I had a newly acquired, was it a Minnie Mouse?  Not the kind of stuffed animal you could easily sleep with, but she was dressed as a ballerina. I had showed her to Frances, and in Frances's envy, she's spat the words and me quick and hot. Doubtless, these were words she had heard before, spoken under the safety of her own roof, by her own mother or father, and my dysfunctional albeit plentiful childhood. 

   This Minnie Mouse is by no means my most precious childhood possession. I wonder if she was even dressed as a ballerina, and she no doubt fills a Minne Mouse-shaped space in some landfill somewhere today. 

    Barbie dolls. Teddy Ruxbin. Big Bunny. Barbie shoes gnawed on by the cat.  American Girl dolls, one Mexican, on Swedish. Furby. Dress my mother made me. Don't play with that. It's a collector's item.  Stacking dolls from my dad Russian girlfriend. Bertie Bott's. Meeko. Simba.  Ladybug earrings 14k gold. Opals. Emeralds the size of pinpricks. A miniature kitchen, with miniature dishes and foods made of plastic and tin. A yellow flowered dress and a soft straw hat.  Figure skates. All of the candy and fried pies and chicken skin.  Eskimo Barbie. Barbie and Elvis.  German Barbie.  Corporate Barbie.  Indian Barbie.  Japanese Barbie.  Italian Barbie. Mexican Barbie. Nordic Barbie.  Russian Barbie.  Two glass circus bear piggy banks.  Spice Girl trading cards.  Barbie clothes.  Doll clothes.  A mountain bike. Another mountain bike.  Two sleds.  A baseball glove.  Metal bats.  Tennis racquet.  A metal detector.  Costume jewelry and make-up.  A purple wig. A diary with a broken lock.  Halloween candy six months old. Easter baskets bent with trailing tinsel-like grass.  Books. And more books. Old picture books. Pop-up books.  Chapter books and Goosebumps.  Novels and classics. Paperback and hardbound, hardcover.  A shirt from American Eagle. Enough barrettes.  Clearasil.  Hair straightener.  A shirt from Amercrombie and Fitch.  Jeans the next size up. New running shoes.  Black MaryJanes.  A sweater for Confirmation.  Dress pants the next size up.  Graduation shirt and shawl.  Cut-off shorts. Khaki shorts.  Platform sandals. Leather pumps.

The most precious item from my child might be in the little oak box I thought belonged to my great-grandmother, but it was something my father had found at a garage sale.  My most precious possession might be  the bunny I dragged with me to college, and eventually throughout into a dumpster without even looking back. 

My saxophone that I sold.