Sentimental Value

Never fear, fellow writers. This blog post does lead to an idea I have for a collection of short fiction. But until I get there, please allow me to indulge in a little sentimentality. Or should I rephrase that and say that I find myself in a reflective mood lately. I think I've mentioned before that my mother has recently celebrated her 91st birthday. Here she is with my lovely Dad (who, alas, is no longer with us) celebrating their golden wedding anniversary in July 1996.

I was with her other week, glasses of wine to hand and, as one does when mellow,  we began to discuss her wishes when she eventually passes away regarding items of sentimental value; money and valuables have already been taken into consideration.

The chat was not in any way morbid. We were enjoying reminiscing and chatting about the trivia we all collect through life that mean nothing to anyone else but we wouldn't dream of throwing out. Fis instance I already own the art nouveau epergne given to my grandmother by her best friend of that time who had married a conscientious objector. There's the jug (broken and patched together) which once belonged to my great-great grand-father and was used to collect milk from the farm down the lane when my aunt went to visit.

My mum with her older siblings, Nina and Eric.

On my mum's lading sits an empty carved wooden box we call the thunderstorm box. She knows I adore it. It has no monetary value whatsoever.It's Indian, made of an unidentifiable wood elaborate carvings on it, including a fierce oriental dragon devouring a deer in its jaws on the lid. (Probably a folk tale I do not recognise.)

It now stands on a table on my mum's landing. When I was a child, it stood on her dressing-table and woe betide anyone who moved it! Why? Well, my dad bought it in India while on active service in India. He sent it rolled in a carpet to mum whom he married in 1946 two years before they married. I also remember the Indian carpet as it lay on several hall floors until pounding feet, sunlight and moths did their worst. Anyway, the story goes that my mother took delivery of this huge parcel during one of the most violent thunderstorms she ever remembered. Dad added that he dispatched  it during the monsoon season. And here myth begins to take over from reality. Every time the box was moved - even to a new shelf or table, it caused a thunderstorm. If you ask me, I would say, I happened time and time again. I was there!

My maternal grandmother, Laura.

Over twenty years ago when I started to write fiction, I wrote a short story called The Dragon Box and it was published somewhere. (I no longer have a copy or remember the name of the publication.) It did not have anything to do with my life., It is not about childhood in any way. But it did have the box and a thunderstorm.

So you see - threads of fiction are always weaving themselves together in a fiction-writer's head. I'm now even thinking of writing  a collection of linked stories under the working title 'Sentimental Value.'

However, I do worry how the word "sentiment" and its derivatives has been denigrated over recent years. How often do we read a book, watch a movie or even listen to a piece of music only to dismiss it as "sentimental" as if it's a bad thing. Critics are always sniffy about sentimentality.

Sentimental. I found these synonyms. mawkish, cloying, sickly, saccharine, sugary, syrupy, romantic, heart and flowers, touching, pathetic etc etc

Is this how I'm feeling?  Surely not. What do you think? Have you a better description of what I'm talking about.