Remember grandma’s button jar? An eclectic collection accumulated over a lifetime, sometimes handed down from generation to generation. It was from a time when we wore out our clothing. The buttons were carefully snipped off and reused. There was a time when the precious contents were used as a cold winter afternoon’s amusement; grouping and counting out the ones that were the same, and sometimes strung on a string for a pretty. Among the treasures could be the large brassy buttons off a gentleman’s suit, the super tiny ones of a man’s shirt. (never could figure out why the smallest buttons were imposed on the larger hands!) Then there were the cute ones, little plastic ducks or hearts. Used and reused for the many children in the home. Pearl shaped buttons, delicate and beautiful and too often, in the jar because one of the ten had gotten lost and so the whole lot needed to be re-purposed. Sitting around the table, spilling the colourful circles out, began the family stories. ‘remember when’- this was on that dress that grandma made, the outfit I wore to-, and the memories warm the room. My current button jar is not a jar at all, but a small plastic box, filled with unimaginative extra’s clipped from the inside seam of new garments. The family collection was shared with a daughter when she was teaching kindergarten and needed counters.

Ah, but I do have a junk drawer. Not truly a drawer but a whole series of shelves. The more space one has the more space one fills! When I was a child there was a kitchen drawer that was filled with the necessary things- small hammer, pliers, screwdrivers, flashlight, etc. and then, as we walked past with an item we didn’t want to walk all the way to its home, we opened the drawer and popped it in. You could find washers, and match books, and various size nails and screws. Still in the same utilitarian family, right? Dig deeper and there were bits of string and twine, twist ties, odds and sods. Every once in a while, mom would dump the whole thing out, discard the debris, organize and utter dire threats to those who misused ‘her’ space. Inevitably, shortly after a purge one would need something that had been thrown out. In my kitchen is one drawer that contains the phone book, the manuals for the appliances, spare candles and soup can labels. That is as close to a junk drawer as I get. Because- in the entrance I have not one, but two closets. One with a bank of shelves. Here reside my house tools, cans of nuts, washers, nails and sundry metal things. Perfect for picture hanging needs and small repairs. Some of the filled containers grew from the laundry room. All those years of farming and shop working allowed me to empty many a heavy pocket! Easier by far to chuck the finds into a tin that carry the find back down and outside. Interesting finds, both the button jar and the junk drawer.