Collected, and calm

A recently-purchased kitchen utensil had a rather substantial tag attached to it with a ball chain, which I removed, throwing away the tag and adding the chain to my collection. I keep them in a small metal box all hooked together in one long chain. I don’t know how many there are, but the last time I tried to measure it, it was over 24 feet long. I have no idea how or when or why I started keeping every ball chain I come across.

Collecting in my family was limited to the women, as far as I can remember, and they all pretty much limited themselves to one collectible each. My mother collected plates, which she hung on the walls of her kitchen and dining area. Her mother collected small cup-and-saucer sets, which I remember being displayed on shelves with the saucer standing up behind its matching tea cup.

I don’t remember Grandma Knez ever collecting anything, but Aunt Blanche collected salt and pepper shakers numbering in the hundreds, and Aunt Mae collected milk glass.

I, on the other hand, did and/or do collect all kinds of things, although some of my collections, like the ball chains, are more accurately described as accumulations. I don’t seek the items out but do add them whenever they come my way.

Except for the cribbage boards, of which I have a couple dozen, including two or three large ones, all the things I used to or still do collect are small: salt cellars, golf course pencils, bookmarks, shot glasses, squished pennies. Storing and displaying, therefore, does not require a great deal of space.

Then too, as an amateur genealogist, I also collect dead relatives. They take up no room at all.