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Eleanor Johnstone's avatar

A whimsical, stuffed red apple remains on the closet floor. Not something my mother would have taken on the weekend trip. Also, not something she would have intended to leave. Truly, not a thing with any intended purpose. Like so many things in the home - whimsy, out of use, out of date - but holding, teasing her with some tangible leader line to a pinprick of light in the depth of memory. A tiny scene that will otherwise never play out again, never surface for brief, sparkling, warming recollection.

My cat is set down in her closet, safe from the resident dogs. And this apple is right there, among the otherwise organized shoes, sweaters, scarves, and a stashed bottle of The Good Stuff. At first, I give it no mind. But each time I pass through, to see how the cat is faring, I see the apple, and I think more on that than the cat. What was a stuffed calico apple meant for, before? What size dog, what size cat?

I think my mother's answer is not about the why. Her answer, for so many beautiful silly useless things, is about the who, the where, the when. This apple is the doorknob, granting access to her collection of lives lived that threaten forgetting if we discard all of the things they left behind.

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Julie B's avatar

I look up to the paper quite infrequently these days while I’m lying in our bed. I can’t really say that you left it behind either. After all, you did not write it. You did not tape it to the ceiling. You did not really even follow the instructions… like… ever. You were only a shell of your whole (real) self at that point too. Why do I keep it taped there? The lines of the lined paper have faded with time and sun. My memories are fading with time and sun.

Maybe for me it is a reminder of how far you went. Your skeleton lying in that bed. Your body trying to abandon your soul, and starting to take your mind with it. You, Alex, staring at the ceiling, finding shapes -and friends- in the paint splotches. A squirrel (of course… though I still can’t find it). Your last PT exercises written down, I taped them on the ceiling for your entertainment. No. I taped them on the ceiling in the hopes that you would be inspired to perform. That your body would somehow find the strength to lift its knees and roll itself over if only you could read the instructions.

The shapes you could find in the letters. The amusement from reading a few words in a sentence with different inflections. Days of entertainment. Of course you could no longer make the movement of a straight leg raise, or do ‘disco with a band’ for some shoulder movement. But your imagination was still as wild as ever, and you could make stories from an X and the shapes in someone else’s handwriting.

How long should I leave it taped there on the ceiling above our bed?

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