The Collector

What is the saying? One man's junk is another's treasure? That little saying certainly effectively describes children too. It never ceases to amaze me what my children find the sparkle of treasure in. It can be a rock, pine cone, a broken toy to a scratched up, rusted penny. It is endearing but it is also painful for a habitual clean freak such as myself. At every given opportunity, I will donate and/or throw away junk that is never used within our house. My husband on the other hand is like a squirrel and will burrow it away into the deep recesses of the basement "just in case" we have a need of it somewhere in the future. Apparently my children come by it honestly then.

Going to Nana's house is like a treasure hunter's dream for my children, because like my husband, Nana does not throw anything away. Her house is filled to the brim with junk and trinkets galore and while it can become amusing, if not down right entertaining, it can become worrisome at just what my children will discover and what Nana will attempt to pawn off on me ... erm ... the kids.

This past weekend was no exception with cleaning out crawl spaces and closets at Nana's house. Decrepit, ripped up suitcases, old rusted camping gear, 20+ year old toys that don't work anymore to dusty sporting equipment was discovered. And, much to my son's excitement, boxes of old trophies too. Within seconds of Kaelen's discovery, the calculated gleam came to Nana's eyes and before long, Kaelen was the proud new owner of four old trophies. Kaelen excited beyond belief at his good fortune and Nana's incredible generosity quickly picked out two hockey and one soccer trophy for himself.


In his excitement, he continued to badger me for the remainder of the weekend to have his picture taken with his favorite trophy:

Now, this is the part where I must confess that this particular treasure hunt was a sentimental treasure hunt for me. The trophies that my son was insistent upon having? They were some of my dad's hockey trophies for MVP of the league and national championships. And, being the beautiful child that my son is, he so innocently claimed that his grandpa would be happy to give them to him because he (Kaelen) loved hockey too and would be just as good as his grandpa. Kaelen then went on to ask if his grandpa could see him from heaven and proceeded to look up into the air and thank his grandpa for the trophies and that he would win lots when he grew up to share with him too (grandpa).

So, this begs a question for myself, how could I not like treasure hunting now?