Day 19/30: Things I Won't Be Buying Today

 

One of the less physical things we had to do in order to earn a merit badge in Girl Scouts was to "begin a collection". Now, this was the 1970s and some of my troopmates already had collections. They collected neon-haired troll dolls, Barbies, Lincoln wheat pennies, comic books, and miniature football helmets. One friend even collected unusual soda cans and she had them glued on to a tall shelf, made by her father, expressly for said purpose. She had a grape Nehi, cemented front and center, that I adored.

Me? I began collecting frogs. Not living and breathing frogs, of course, but little frogs made of ceramic and clay and glass. Frogs with crowns balanced upon their heads were special favorites. A family I babysat for gifted me their frog collection so that my own shelf grew from three to fifty frogs overnight, sort of like when tadpoles hatch in the early summer. 

My frog collection currently lives in my basement in an old banana box strewn with yellowed newspaper. I haven't looked through the box in thirty eight years. I don't want to get rid of them but I don't want to display them either. That's sort of how old stuff is.

As a teenager, I began collecting Laurel Burch goldtone and silvertone artfully enameled earrings. Laurel began selling her designs in the 1970s and finally caught on in my small town in the early 1980s, quickly becoming a sort of status symbol for the waspy and well-heeled in our community. I received my first pair as a gift and was immediately smitten. I loved everything about them; the colors, the weight, the sturdiness. My second pair, which I spent four weeks of hard earned babysitting money on, was stolen from my gym locker the very first day I wore them to school, and the girl who (I think) stole them wore them repeatedly, flaunting them beneath her Jane Wiedlin-style pixie cut as she sat, alphabetically, two seats over from me throughout all of our classes together. 

 

During the pandemic, I started looking for more pairs to supplement my small but distinctive collection. Every pair I owned held a merry story. Laurel uses a lot of nature, birds and cats. I find solace in nature, birds and cats and I found plenty of solace available on eBay and other resale sites. After selling a few things to justify my spending, I bought some vintage pairs and now have over a dozen. I do imagine that's enough, though, and have since pumped the brakes.

A week ago, a friend on Facebook, during a moment of nostalgia, asked where everyone bought Laurel Burch earrings back in the day. I was about to grab the ceramic box I store mine in, snap an exceptional photo and reply with great gusto until someone else replied and referred to them as "crap". Crap? Oh my gosh. My special collectible earrings? This crap is symbolic of my adolescence, almost as much as bonfires, football games, summertime at the lake and weaving daisy chains on the porch. When I wear them (which is a lot) I'm happy. I'm young. And when I catch my reflection and see a violet-hued bluebird hanging festively from my lobe, I exhale gladness, recalling a time before everything got crazy and depersonalized and tinged with snarky hostility. 

I will not be buying any Laurel Burch earrings, but I did select and retrieve ones shaped like doves within a heart from their safekeeping today. They happen to be pink and green, our preptastic color scheme of the '80s. I will wear them and love them and when complimented on them, as I so often am, I will use them as a jumping off point for conversation with a like-minded stranger about a time when they symbolized the height of what we thought of as middle class opulence.

 #mushroomtumbler