Boring Backstory: My parents passed away just 3 days shy of a year apart and as I’m going through their things…the muses toy with my brain.
My mom had this mop bucket for my entire life…and my brother’s entire life before me. We are 12 years apart, so it’s almost a generation.
We found it tucked in the closet with a newer super industrial, monstrosity of a wringing mop, rolling bucket, contraption. It’s very technical.
Even though, she had something newer and more convenient, she couldn’t part with that lifetime blue bucket, and now, it’s mine.
BLISSCRAFT of Hollywood it says on the bottom. Mom had a Hollywood bucket!
I remember her clearly in her spongy flip flops with the suede on the thong plunging the mop in the Pine Sol scented water and wringing it by hand every week without fail in the South with no air conditioning.
Our window unit had quit many moons before and we couldn’t afford another.
I can see the sweat beaded on her upper lip as she cleaned the rented house she never loved. The vomit-colored shag carpet burned in my mind’s eye just like every sound and every smell in that place lapping with 70s decor…the backdrop of my childhood.
It’s painfully surreal to remain after the people who made you are gone.
My roots and my history are mine alone to maintain. My biggest fans are now ashes. No one new will know who they were unless we tell them.
All the tears and the pain tell me how very blessed I was to have parents who cared. They cared more for me than for themselves, so for the last 4 years, I tried to return the favor to no avail.
I don’t know what I’ll use this bucket for, but it might as well be made of gold for the memories it holds in its emptiness.
Thanks for reading. ♥
I love you cuz! I am sitting here sobbing! I am so thankful I got to see your dad one last time. And I am so sad that so many years were robbed from us. I wish I knew if life would be different. I wish I could write like you or even a little bit. I wish I could share all of my memories of our little grandma with you and Cyndy. I wish I could hear your moms cute NC accent one more time. It’s very hard when all we both have of our parents is ashes. No stone to visit, or place to put flowers. Just memories. I hope I never loose my memories. I wish I was an amazing writer like you so I could put them on paper for my grand baby! ❤️
❤️I love you cousin!❤️ It may be just a bucket to others, but like you said “it might as well be made out of gold” I know you will cherish this bucket & keep it full with the memories and love you have in your heart! ❤️❤️❤️