Senti-mental.

I stood for a minute with my hand hovering over the garbage can.  In my hand was a coloring book.  It was fully scribbled in, shredded and the cover was barely staying on.  It's the first coloring book Girl had ever used.  I didn't feel a need to keep it, and it was cluttering up my living room.  There were no pages left and Girl was no longer interested in it, having moved on to a new one.  I wanted to throw it away, but was suddenly second guessing myself.

This is probably how hoarders start. 

I'm not a hoarder.  I'm not the kind of person who throws everything away either.  I think I have a good balance.  I save a few things for sentimental reasons, and try really hard not to keep things that I'm no longer using.  Husband may disagree, but then I send him to the backyard garage/car graveyard/future project department and he's quiet. 

I know where this sudden attachment is coming from.  Luckily I understand it, so I can deal with it.  I don't need or want an old coloring book.  I just want things that I can no longer have. 

When I was a kid, my dad made me a dollhouse.  It wasn't a normal dollhouse (where would the fun be in that).  My dad was a draftsperson so he spent much of his time working on blueprints, floorplans etc, so he made me a dollhouse that looked like you cut the roof off a nice little bungalow.  It wasn't the typical multi-floor dollhouse.  It lay flat on the ground and had hardwood floors, baseboards, a fireplace and 4 rooms.

I rarely played with it.  I wasn't a doll person.  I would use it mainly when friends came over, but otherwise, it kind of took up space.  When I had officially abandoned dolls in general, my parents and I made the decision to give it away.  There was a girl, a few years younger than me, and if my memory serves me correctly, she had just had her tonsils out or something.  I don't remember being friends, or even really seeing her after that, but she loved dolls, and completely appreciated the dollhouse and box of barbie stuff I gave her. 

Since then, my dad died.

Things change when people die.  Compound that with the arrival of a little girl to our house.  I want it back. 

I have no qualms about calling the girl up and asking if the dollhouse is collecting dust in some remote corner of her parent's basement, and if so, asking for it back.  Problem is, I don't know who she is.  My mom and I racked our brains and came up short.  The person we thought it was had no idea what we were talking about, and really, thinking about it later, it wouldn't have made sense to give it to her, since her dad was a woodworker and he made her dollhouses of her own. 

I have to resign myself that it's gone, and that even if I spent the next 10 years looking for it, it is unlikely that I will ever know what became of it. 

One day, Girl may want something, and I hope I have the forsight to save it for her, but luckily, it probably won't be an old coloring book. 

I threw it away.