nixon

When I was a child, my grandmother had a button box. If you are not familiar with the concept, it was a big old metal candy tin filled with hundreds of buttons, mostly unmatched. I loved the button box. It was one of my favorite things. I spent hours upon hours looking through the buttons, arranging them by color or shape or size, dreaming about the outfits they must have been for. I still recall specific buttons: tiny red hearts, huge fabric-covered disks.

I mention this because I am an idiot.

You see, my mother bought me a coat for Xmess. Today, I took all of the tags off, along with the replacement button which was attached to them. I set it down one place, and then another, and finally on my bookshelf. There, it settled in beside a button which had fallen off a pair of pants weeks ago, and needed sewing. Huh, I though to myself, I am so going to lose those buttons. This led me down a thought path where I mourned some other buttons, now lost, including a pair of big flashy rhinestone ones I need to fix my skirt for the Gorey Ball. At which point I realized how bright and organized I would be if I just found a container, and devoted it to the keeping of clothingless buttons.

And then I stopped and laughed out loud.