It was a hot summer day in Vermont. Yes, Vermont can get quite hot in the summer. Our daughter and her children were visiting from Massachusetts. We decided to head to nearby Shelburne Beach. Not only was there a beach, there was a playground and our grandchildren love-love-love playgrounds. They enjoyed the swings, the slides, the bouncing spring ponies and all things climbable.
I found a spot on a bench at the edge of the playground overlooking beautiful Lake Champlain and sat down to gaze out at the boats on the lake. Penny, who was about 4 years old at the time, came over to join me on the bench. She then quickly scooted off the bench and squatted down to look at something in the grass that caught her eye. When she stood up she had a tiny yellow dot, a little round sticker, stuck to the tip of her finger. How on earth did she spot that tiny, tiny little dot? She has good eyes for spotting small things. She kept that tiny yellow dot on the tip of her finger the entire time we were there. At one point she placed it on my finger and I was put in charge of taking care of the little yellow dot. Later she transferred it back to her finger and cared for the tiny yellow dot on the car trip back to our house and into the evening. The last time I saw the little yellow dot it was heading up the stairs on Penny’s finger for a bedtime story. I don’t know what finally happened to the yellow dot, but I still remember how she treated it as a tiny treasure.
A few days ago I took a canvas bag out of my closet to carry some art supplies to a class. At the bottom of the bag, I noticed a small piece of paper. When I pulled it out, I discovered it was a ticket stub. It was my ticket stub for when Tom and I went to see the film Little Women. The date on the ticket was January 9, 2020. Remember how we just went to a movie with total abandon before we entered the pandemic? Tom and I rarely missed a week without a trip to the nearby movie theater.
I don’t think Little Women was the last film we saw before we began quarantine, but it was certainly one of the last ones. Theaters are beginning to open again now, but Tom and I just aren’t ready to go back quite yet. We are fortunate to be able to stream films on Netflix and Prime and Hulu, as well as finding great fare on PBS. But these home viewings do not compare to seeing a film in a dark theater with surround-sound and a screen that stretches from one wall to the next.
Finding that ticket stub was like finding an artifact. A tiny treasure from a time past.
I started to think about the other tiny treasures I have tucked away, intentionally or accidentally. I pulled out an old blue tin, I keep in the drawer of a chest next to my desk.
What had I tucked away inside this tin? Tiny treasures. I discovered an assortment of political campaign buttons, ranging from Kennedy and Johnson to Clinton and Gore. And the Beatles. Don’t forget the Beatles!
There were my pins from both Brownies and Girl Scouts. The largest treasure was a great big button that says JEANNE. I was amazed to find a button that spelled my name correctly. My father bought me that button at the NC State Fair long ago. There were pins that I collected when I studied in Wales—St. David’s Cathedral, St. Mellagell, Cymru, as well as pins from a variety of Episcopal dioceses. Even one from Presiding Bishop Michael Curry from an evening Tom and I shared dinner with him when we were in New York City.
My favorite re-discovered tiny treasure was a little wooden dog with my name on it. For all the years I can remember living at my childhood home in Raleigh, there was a plaque hanging in our hallway that asked the question “Who’s in the Doghouse Now?” There was a little doghouse with a peg and then a dog for each person in our family. We could put one another into the doghouse. Just for the fun of it. Somehow I managed to salvage my dog. I don’t know what happened to the others.
There was my identification card from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Who is that young woman with the long dark brown hair? There was my old Virginia Driver’s License with a photo taken right after I got a rather large and unruly perm. It might have been the only time I have heard my husband gasp when I walked in the door.
There are a few lovely notes and tiny artistic creations from my children when they were young enough to write sweet notes professing to never, never, ever leave their mommy and to always, always love me. The love has stayed in place but they have both left to make their own ways in the world, just as they should have.
There a tiny little cloth elephant—only about 3 inches tall— that I found in a box of items set out with a trash can on the street when I lived in Atlanta. He had to be rescued.
Tiny treasures. None of these items are valuable and yet they are priceless as they take me back in time. They bring back memories that I cherish. None are about the big events in my life, but about the tiny things, the brief moments we can so easily miss.
What have you found in a coat pocket or a purse you haven’t seen in a while? What do you have tucked away in a drawer or on the back of a closet shelf? What small items do you have that are treasures? What might you notice in the grass at your feet if you really take a moment to notice, to see, to treasure?
I think my granddaughter Penny had it right that day when she found that little yellow dot in the grass at Shelburne Beach. There are always tiny treasures waiting to be discovered if only we open our eyes and our hearts.
I'm so glad you shared this special story! Penny always finds the tiny treasures!
What a joy to read this, We are surrounded by tiny treasures everywhere if we just open our eyes!