Material Things

The statuette on the shelf, a souvenir from a Mexican market. It was our first vacation together - our honeymoon. I can feel the heat, the sweat dripping down my neck as we sought shade in the tiny open-air shop. We moved away from the blankets, too warm in that corner, besides we already had two. We needed smaller trinkets for the family back home. Those still cleaning up from the reception and saying goodbye to the relatives who came from so far away just to see us begin our lives together. I remember bartering with the smaller dark-skinned man. His accent was heavy and I only knew a few words of Spanish. Money, however, was universal. I walked away once or twice and the price finally fell to an agreeable amount. I don't know if he cared or not, but I would have paid more - because you liked it. We played the game, though, taking off pesos and adding memories. A marble eagle - symbol of a nation's history. It sits on our shelf now, and we forget to dust it. Yet I don't know what we'd do if we ever lost it. A key that unlocks a treasure chest of blue ocean, tropical breezes, and bus drivers going ninety miles an hour until some tourist yells "Alto!" and we careen to a stop. I think of these things when I rush through the living room, once again late for work. I remember the humid air in the hotel - the open halls where breezes carried the thick smell of plants and moist dirt on either side of us as we walked hand in hand back from the beach. Sometimes I look around the rest of the room and am swept away by a million other scenes. How cluttered and joyous - each nook and cranny filled by our lives. These material things that make our house our home.