Sam says that his old room, now putatively Emma's room but really more of a guest room, looks like a grandfather's room. It's got my lovely antique bed, now seriously warped by its two year sojourn in the basement. It has the National Geographic sepia framed map of the world, embossed with Emma's name, which my father gave her to track her travels around the world, complete with color coded pins for marking where she's been and where she would like to go. It's got my gorgeous but impractical vanity, split in two with the mirror hung upside down on the wall by the bed like a kinky shield. No sign of Emma, really. Even the map looks strangely impersonal.
When I emptied her old room of stuff to make way for Sam, I found some strange things. Like this corn-on-the-cob stuffed animal - scratch that - stuffed vegetable, with its sombrero and swashbuckling mustache. And this pink crepe paper ball, held together with wire. Who designed these things? Who looked at the design, pulled out the checkbook and said, "By God, yes! Let's do it!" Who worked on the corn doll assembly line? What did they think about, day after day, gluing mustaches hour upon hour, on their feet all day?
Yet removing these things is what took Emma's personality from the space, leaving me missing her and regretting the sudden move. I talked with her today. She sounded subdued, but competent. Like she's doing what needs to be done. Like she's adjusting.
I guess I'm adjusting, too. As the stuff project progresses, the empty spaces in the house - the blank wall where the vanity once was in my bedroom, for example - feel peaceful. Soothing. Like maybe I'd like to get rid of it all except my tent, my mess kit, my two burner stove, my sleeping bag, my lantern, three pairs of underwear, two shirts, two pairs of pants and a warm winter coat. Toothpaste, toothbrush and shampoo. On the sandy shore of Lake Michigan, watching the sun set. Leaving the corn dolls behind, along with everything else.
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