Forty-nine years ago my grandmother slid some treasures into envelopes for her three granddaughters. (Her only grandson wasn’t born yet and thusly missed out.) She gave the envelope to my mother for safekeeping until we got older.
For years Mom asked me if I wanted the treasures and I kept saying no because they weren’t really treasures. Yesterday I finally gave in. Here are the contents of that envelope in all their glory.
I was three years old for most of 1976, but I remember the bicentennial celebration being HUGE. Flags were everywhere. But none of these treasures are worth any more than their face value because we didn’t know at the time that folding up an in-circulation two dollar bill kills its value. We didn’t know that four coins stacked in a paper envelope for decades dings them up.
The real treasure, though, is her shaky handwriting on the envelope.
I am two generations from a woman who was pulled out of school permanently in first grade to care for her siblings. She taught herself to read and write.
My life has been a gift much more valuable than four dollars of bicentennial money.
I’ll put the money back into the envelope and put the envelope into my memory box like the treasure it is.
Note: The US attacked Iran after I finished and scheduled this draft. I am fully aware of the atrocities happening and am truly against it (I’m in favor of primarying EVERYONE in Congress at this juncture) but other than “oh hey, it’s my third go-round with the US dumbfucking around in the Middle East” I have no words. My thoughts are with the innocents being attacked, and our soldiers who’ll be sent there to die.
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