Remnants Of A Broken Marriage

While I sobbingly packed up my dream home as my marriage was in tatters around me, I ruthlessly gave away anything sentimental. Boxes and boxes of photos — both framed and not — family heirlooms and wedding gifts given to us long ago when we were still young and full of hope. I also off-loaded at least two-thirds of my kitchen.

For the next two years, I bounced from one temporary place to stay to another.

When I finally had a permanent home to move into, and began to unpack the boxes I had kept, I was amused to see what I had saved: instead of my childhood photo albums, I had six containers of collagen and three of powdered MCT oil — now long past the expiration date — that I had bought on sale for my ex-husband because he liked it in his coffee.

I no longer had the photo of my grandparents laughing candidly at my wedding shortly before my grandmother passed away, or my pasta maker, but I had an old vintage rolling pin that I bought for $3 at a garage sale. Half my dishes and knives were gone, as well as my bathroom rug, but to this day, I can’t tell you what happened to them.

Remnants of a Broken Marriage

Photo: Andrea Piacquadio/Pexels

I ruthlessly got rid of all the clothes that would have fit me now, but I was skinny then from over-exercising and under-eating and had only kept what draped well on my tinier frame. Over half my former closet now sits folded daintily in laundry tubs to take to Goodwill since I mostly wear sweatpants and baggy men’s clothing these days.

I still had a cast iron pan that was too heavy to lift one-handed, and a couple of scorched saucepans, but nothing that made me want to cook. And the good pots and pans? Yep, you guessed it; those were part of the kitchen accessories I had handed off like I was doling out an overgrowth of unwanted zucchini from a garden gone wild.

I had an electric lawn mower — bought when I fantasized about doing my part to not pollute as much, and when I had a small, pristine, manageable lawn at my former home — but no batteries to power it. I had a trowel, but no pruning shears or shovels. I possessed my ex’s ski coat — which he told me he didn’t want nor need — and my old wedding dress.

It was more bitter than sweet finding that plastic-sheathed dupioni silk dress.

I sat on the floor of the garage, running my fingers over the soiled hemline, realizing I had never quite gotten around to cleaning and donating the dress. And now it was 15 years old and — while still fashionable — I wasn’t interested in spending $150 to dry clean this reminder of the past that I neither wanted nor needed.

My prized plants — once so healthy and happy and lush — were now just ceramic pots filled with dry dusty soil, and while I had two staplers and an outdated printer, I no longer owned a pair of scissors. Gone somewhere was the handful of family heirlooms (did I sell them? Give them away? I honestly can’t remember anymore.)

Remnants Of A Broken Marriage

Sometimes the life you leave behind lingers on.

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