The Value of What Remains

Taji Torrilhon — The Value of What Remains

So, I am not attached to stuff, which kind of sounds altruistic, but actually means I’m pretty careless with things. I once accidentally donated my very favorite sweater to Goodwill to give you an idea. My wife, on the other hand, is fastidious. She is careful and intentional with everything that she has.

But I come by my anti-stuff neurosis for a few very good reasons. One, I moved every year of my life until I was 17. Two, I had parents who just didn’t parent. And three, I lost everything I owned when I was 10 years old. It was February, and it had been raining for a month straight, which was actually not that unusual for the little northern California town where I’m from. And on that day, though, I woke up to my mom shaking me, saying, pack a bag, we’re leaving as soon as we can. So I got up, I went to the window, and I was stunned at what I saw outside. There was this rushing river of ground-sludging water where our street used to be, and the cars parked on the street were filling up with water while I watched in real time.

And so I threw some things in a bag, and I looked back out that window not even five minutes later, and I couldn’t believe how high the water had gotten. The single-story house across the street that I was looking down on from my second-story window was gone. There was a teeny bit of the roof peeking up, but it was basically underwater. The next thing I knew, we were climbing out that window, because it was the only safe way out of the house, into my neighbor’s boat, and there we were, floating down my street, navigating our way around these big tree branches and floating furniture. And I remember looking back at my house, filling with water, thinking, I wonder if I’m ever going to see my room again. And sure enough, the only things of mine that survived that flood were the few things that I threw in that bag that day.

And in the middle of this scary, traumatic event, I was scared and shocked, and I just couldn’t process it, really. So I did what a lot of kids do. I came up with a way to make something scary not so scary. And my coping mechanism of choice was detachment. I just decided I didn’t need that stuff anyway, and I got on with it, which kind of tells you the sort of overly mature 10-year-old that I was. But over time, this coping mechanism just sort of settled into my personality, and I became someone who was not precious about stuff and kind of took pride in it. It was like, if I don’t love it, then I won’t miss it when it’s gone, which worked great until I met, fell in love with, and later married a woman who was beautiful and smart and funny and very attached to her stuff.

And, you know, just to be clear, my wife is not a materialistic person. She doesn’t like shopping. She is a regular in our buy-nothing Facebook group. But this is a woman who still has her favorite red ruler from grade school on her desk, and she just recently got rid of this black fisherman’s cap that she was wearing the very first time I saw her 25 years ago, which is charming and also something I just never understood. Until one day, we were up in Mendocino walking around the headlands, and it was one of those rainy days, and we were all bundled up in jackets and scarves and gloves and hats, and it was raining on us, but I didn’t care. We were taking pictures, had a great day. It’s one of my favorite places to go. And we ended up back in the hotel room, kind of peeling off all of our wet layers, and I felt something strange on my hand, or actually something not on my hand, and I looked down, and I realized my wedding ring was gone.

And I panicked. And I tore apart the hotel room. I looked in every pocket. And when I finally got to the gloves I was wearing that day, and they were empty, I realized what must have happened is when I took my gloves off to take a picture, my ring must have fallen off at the headlands. And I felt sick. It was the same sinking feeling I felt decades later, floating down that street, watching my house full of water. It was this deep and immediate sense of loss and grief that I hadn’t let myself feel for a very long time. And back then, I was wondering, am I ever going to see my room again? And now I was older and wiser, and I knew that ring was gone forever. And maybe for the first time, I felt ashamed for having lost something, because it wasn’t just something, it was our ring.

My ring, our ring, the one we’d had specially designed and made for our wedding, back before it was legal, and then the one that I’d worn for almost two decades of moves and travel and parenthood, and our second wedding when it finally was legal. This ring had seen some things, and it was gone. And I was crushed because it just felt irreplaceable. About a year later, we were in Ojai celebrating our 20th anniversary, and I still had not replaced that ring, because I felt like I just couldn’t. But we decided to go hiking with some friends, and so I parked the car, and my wife went off to see if they were there. And when I had almost caught up with her, I saw her on the ground in front of me, which was strange, so I kind of picked up my pace. And when I got there, I realized that she was kneeling and smiling, and had something small in her hand.

And she said to me, you know, we never really did proposals for our wedding. We just kind of decided to get married for both of them. But I’m going to do it now, with this ring. So will you stay married to me? And I said yes, and she put her ring on it. And I am very attached to this ring now, because I think allowing myself to feel terrible about that loss of that first ring really helps me understand how special an object can be. And as you might imagine, I take very good care of this right now, because I have realized that sometimes taking care of our stuff is a way of taking care of our people.