Painting Butterflies

03 // hairbrush

there's a small hairbrush, one for a doll's. it lays somewhere in a box with all my other childhood toys, lost in the attic. most toys seem to hold value to people, and that's why they keep them, right?

not really for me. i've never been fond of toys and trinkets. but this one brush, a mere piece of curvy wood stuck to hair-like bristles, that has incomparable value to me. 

and mostly because of when i was packing one day. it was a hot summer, and i was moving into my dorm room. i had too many cardboard boxes to count which had to somehow fit into a tiny room. 

oh sir, it was one of those days where i had too much on my mind and too little time to figure out exactly what it was that consumed my thoughts.

so when i had opened the dresser drawer and grabbed the brush, i hadn't realized just what i was holding. when i looked down, all these memories poured in.

grandmother was just a month from her death, but an innocent four year old had no idea how permanent death was. grandmother had been an idol to me. i don't know where i'd be without her.

she pulled me aside one day and whispered, "do you want to see something special?"

i nodded vigorously. 

"okay." she waddled upstairs with me tagging along. she pulled a plastic hairbrush out of a space behind her dresser. the space had a fist-like flap, so i had guessed that the previous owners had been angry one night.

even so, i thought my grandmother was smart to cover it up with a bulky piece of furniture, and then hide something in the hole.

her eyes were sparkling when she looked back up at me. "this was made by my big brother, your great-uncle, for me when i was sick with chicken pox one year. it was the kindest gesture i remember from my younger years, and i've treasured it since.

"i want you to have it. i would hate for anyone else to find it and throw it away, or worse. you take good care of it, okay?"

i nodded again, mesmerized by her words. "okay."

when she died, i laid it at her gravestone, but it somehow appeared in my bathroom the next morning. i tried to return it several times, and each time it came back.

i never was able to lose the dang thing, but i never wanted to. so i made sure it went with me anytime i moved or relocated. 

like the others, this makes no sense but ya know..