The Hope Chest

Regular readers (and really, are there any other kind around here?) will have noticed my mother's comments in the last entry about the hope chest.  It's partially in reference to a conversation we had around here recently about the cedar chest that currently sits in Oldest's bedroom.

Right around the time my age reached the double digits, I started thinking I'd like a hope chest. (I also spent a lot of time hoping for a chest, but that's another story) It was probably yet another one of those ideas I got from the books I read, the same books that led me to believe I should also be a top-notch teen sleuth, or that I should have a twin sister with whom I shared a red Mustang convertible, or that it would be nice to travel across the prairies in a covered wagon with Ma and Pa.

But regardless, I wanted a hope chest. I'd get my copy of Seventeen magazine every month, and see the ads for Lane cedar chests, and imagine which one would look absolutely perfect at the foot of my bed. When I'd flip through the Sears catalogue, furnishing my dream home in my head, I'd always include a cedar chest in each bedroom.

I imagined filling it gradually with delicate linens and lace doilies that I'd eventually bring into a fairy-tale marriage that included candle-lit dinners every night and angelic babies tucked into four-poster canopied cribs. The cedar chest would be akin to a treasure chest - in my mind's eye I'd lift the lid reverently, inahling the rich cedar fumes, and sort through the items within with a sense of awe and wonder.

Ha.

I eventually did get a cedar chest - like so many other things around here, it came as a cast-off from a family friend who'd passed away and whose household was being dismantled piece by piece. I'd been married a few years, and had two baby girls of my own. "I'll take it!" I insisted, lugging it home under the baleful glare of my husband, who wondered where, exactly, we were going to put it. After all, our bedrooms were 9' x 9', and any spare space in the living room was occupied by toddler trappings like Little Tykes kitchens and doll buggies.

It was a coffee table, for a while. At Christmas, it came in handy as an extra horizontal surface for my decorative village. And it was a good place to store the crystal bowl we'd gotten for a wedding present and never quite figured out the right occasion to use.

When Oldest moved into the new big bedroom in the basement, we put it in her room. How symbolic, I thought! What teenage girl, beginning her transition from child to adult, wouldn't like a hope chest, to begin her own process of gathering important things for a far-away future?

Turns out, my teenaged girl. It was a nice spot for her stereo, for a while, but she's never truly appreciated having this piece of furniture in her possession. And, as she continually reminds us, she's never getting married, or having children, so the romance of linens and doilies and candle-lit dinners is lost on her. The cedar chest will soon move back to the living room, where it will reside once again under the front window. At least I'll be able to put my village out at Christmas time.

It's another opportunity for me to remember that my darling girl is not me. Her hopes and dreams are equally as wonderful, and exciting, and important, but they are not mine - my daughter isn't my "do over."  As she moves into this next phase of her life - university and beyond - she will experience things in a way that is uniquely "her", and not Me, The Sequel. The things that are important to her may be different from the things that were important to me, but they are no less important, for all that. That's been harder to come to terms with than I would have thought, but we're working on it.

In the meantime, I've got a hope chest to move.

Comments

[Linda Sherwood]

I have a hope chest. It was my 16th birthday present. I never used it as a "hope" chest, but I have always used it as a "memory" chest. Most of my important high school memories are in there. As well as some from later on. It is where you will find my cap and gown, various Viking memorabilia and things I wrote a long long time ago, as well as my old journals, some dried up corsages and my high school medals. :)

[Heather C.]

OH I wanted a hope chest too! My cousin had one, darn her... and I wanted one so badly... I asked for it every Christmas.

[Oldest]

Thank God that stupid thing is out of my room!

[x-hausted hubby]

I was just thinking.... what a great big humidor like that could do for my cigars....

[Jenn PB]

I never did get a hope chest and my oldest feels the same as yours. What is with these girls, they read all the same books as we did, why don't they want a hope chest?

[kim]

My Uncle Pete always told me that i had the hope chest for the family. I had the chest the others hoped for....ba-dum-dum.

[mom]

why is the little Tykes kitchen in my basement ?

[bubandpie]

I think we lived the same adolescence. Longing for chests (both kinds), reading about Sweet Valley High.