like warm coats and bald husbands.
They're good for you, reliable, and practical
and so sublime, that to throw aawy would make the
garbage man a thief.
So you hang on, because somthing old is somtimes better
thean somthing new, and what you know is often better,
than a stranger.
These are my thoughts...
they make my sound old, old and tame, and dull
at a time when everybody else is risky and racy
and flashing all that's new and improved in their lives.
New spouses, new careers, new thighs, new lips.
The world is new with trade-ins.
I could keep track, but I don't think I want to.
I grew up in the 60's with practical parents-
a mother who washed aluminum foil after she cooked in it,
then reused it--a father who was happier getting old shoes fixed
than buying new ones.
They weren't poor, my parents, they were just satisfied.
Their marriage was good, their dreams focused.
Their friends lived barely a wave away.
I can see them now, 60's couples in Bermuda shorts
and Banlon sweaters, lawnmowers in one hand,
tools in the other.
The tools were for fixing things- a current rod, the kitchen radio,
the screen door, the oven door, the hem in a dress.
Things you keep.
It was a way of life, and sometimes it made my crazy.
All that re-fixing, re-heating-re-newing...
I wanted just one to be wasteful, waste meant affluence.
Throwing things away meant there'd always be more.
But then my father died, and on that clear autumn night,
in the chill of the hospital room,
I was struck with the pain of learning somtimes there isn't any "more"
Sometimes what you care about most gets used up
and goes away, never to return.
So, while you have it, it's best to love it
and care for it, and fix it when it's broken
and heal it when it's sick.
That's true for marriage, old cars, and children
with bad report cards, and dogs with bad hips.
You keep them beacues they're worth it,
because you're worth it,
Some things you keep....
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