SALON

Friday, Mar 25, 2011 7:30 PM UTC

The box I can’t bring myself to open

At my mother's funeral, I learned she left it for me. Since then, all I can do is imagine what's inside

By

Topics: One Person's Trash, Life stories, Real Families,

The box I can't bring myself to openOld wooden treasure chest with strong glow from inside.

There is a box in the northwest corner of the garage. I have never opened it. It is large enough for me to sleep in if life should ever come to that. But that is not the reason it remains there, sealed with duct tape. Cats have been on it. They jump from it to the window ledge and paw against the pane to let me know I once again trapped them. Mice have run across it. I see turds and tracks in the dust. Maybe they found a weak spot along an edge and made nests inside. Maybe their tiny gnawing teeth tore up what is inside so if I ever have the guts to open it, there will be nothing left recognizable. I hope so.

My mother’s possessions are inside the box. Not all of her possessions. She wasn’t poor. It is what she saved for me. My father told me about this after her funeral. I pretended not to hear. And he said nothing more about it. He may have been afraid too. He was the one who read me stories. Pandora’s Box was my favorite. I always listened for a new ending. I wanted her to leave the box alone and save us all.

I found it in the basement after my father died five years ago. It had my name written in marker and I knew this handwriting. She wrote my name on the small chalkboard in the kitchen almost every day. It was to remind her to tell my father all the horrible things I did as soon as he stepped in the door.

I put extra duct tape on the box and transferred it to my garage. I use it for self-assessment of my current level of sanity. 

On a good day I believe she left me her red silk gown. She found me trying it on in her bedroom one summer afternoon.  And I believe my baby doll is there. All in one piece. And tucked inside a wood cedar box will be my stories. (She must have lied when she said they were burned.) And there will be a letter for me. I created a thousand variations. It is never sweet, but it is sincere. She explains. And is remorseful. And says she loves me in a way that makes me believe it.

On a bad day I think the box holds remnants of the slashed silk gown, and the missing doll head and a box of ashes (because Mom was not a liar, just crazy). And there is no letter. 

But on my worst day I am terrified. If the box is opened more twisted, perverted, spiteful wickedness will be released. The world has had enough of that. So have I.

Every spring cleaning I think about getting rid of the box. But I don’t know how to do it without destroying my world.  

Related Stories

  • The day my baby died

    The hospital told me the “specimen” was too small to bury, but I wanted a funeral for my child
    Lynee Davies March 20, 2011

  • The Christmas that almost worked

    The house was decked with lights and a robot queen. Yet come December 25th, something was missing
    Lynee Davies December 21, 2010

More Lynee Davies.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 70 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

"One Person's Trash" is a personal essay series in honor of spring cleaning, that annual push to purge our homes of unnecessary items. The stories reflect on objects that people can't bring themselves to throw away. If you have a story of your own you'd like to submit, please blog

about it on Open Salon and be sure to include the tag "spring cleaning."

Continue Reading

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Who is "Company Doe"? Corporations accused of wrongdoing win battle to keep identities secret
42 points43 points | 1 comment
vote
"Slave descendants seek equal rights from Cherokee Nation": long, detailed narrative of legal and historical complications in red-white-black relations
29 points30 points | 1 comment
vote
Who is "Company Doe"? Corporations accused of wrongdoing win battle to keep identities secret
7 points8 points | comment
vote
Steven Soderbergh's Liberace biopic shows the famously flamboyant entertainer as a person, not a stereotype
5 points6 points | comment
vote
Experts: Fox News spying scandal a game-changer - I think that crackdown is ideologically driven and I think it’s hard to come to a different conclusion given the vigor with which this justice department has gone after people. So I think it is about a method of control that is badly misplaced.
2 points3 points | 6 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations