Make a List!
Still going through receipts and mental pictures of the rooms of the house to complete the lists of things taken. *** Word to the wise: MAKE LISTS of your things and keep them in your safe. Update them at least once a year. *** Need to find the photo albums and warranty books to make sure I don’t miss anything — and the photos can prove I owned stuff. Need to get the rest of the kitchen stuff into the house and put away, so I know for sure what’s missing in there.
I had a spreadsheet of all of our DVDs that was current through September 2006, so that saved me a lot of trouble. I did not have a list of my jewelry, and that’s making a lot of trouble. It’s not that I had a lot of jewelry, and certainly not many valuable pieces. The thing is, though, that even $3 pairs of earrings add up when you have 30 or 40 pairs. And I had a lot of earrings.
Some more tough discoveries of things that are gone. My high school class ring, 14kt. gold with an emerald spinel. An amber and sterling bracelet with matching ring that my mother bought for me. The sterling silver maltese cross and chain that I wore for my wedding. My great-aunt’s ruby ring. My silver “Ani l’dodi, v’dodi li” ring. My black pearl ring — took me years to find it. My pink mother-of-pearl earrings — the first pair I ever bought.
I keep telling myself it’s just stuff. I came here without it, and I can’t take it with me when I leave. But … well … it was stuff I cared about. I guess I should be grateful that most of the stuff I lost was stuff I didn’t care about. But it’s hard to focus on that when you’ve lost things that can never be replaced. Like my great-aunt’s ring, and the brooch my brother gave me, and the bracelet my mom gave me.
Still … we’re alive. We’re healthy. We still have a home. We still have each other. And that’s really what’s important.