Got hit with a day of thinking back on what I’ve left past boyfriends with. Not metaphorically, of course, just trying to remember what physical items they got as parting gifts. Sure, lots of them have a handful of sappy letters or books of mine, but those things are things I’d want them to look at and remember me. (Do they?) It’s the other things, the ones just sort of left behind that are really on my mind. Once I am smitten, I seem to give everything away. Like Anais, I find myself repeating “No, I want you to have it.” An emptied bottle of absinthe, a box of Atari games, an old green typewriter, some old 70's porn, a lock of my then-pink hair... These are the things that come immediately to mind. Some of these things I do miss, but it’s just unthinkable to consider asking for them back. Maybe I don’t actually miss them, but I know they would mean more to me than to whom I left them with. I am a saver. I am a taker-outer and looker-ater. Wrist bands from amusement parks, ticket stubs, you name it. Anything that I can associate with a warm memory, I’ve kept. This may make it seem like I spend a heap of time reminiscing, which couldn’t be further from the truth. I just think that a good memory should never be wasted. So if I follow this trail of odd items, where do I end up? Back at the beginning, before liking someone so much that I want them to have something that means something to me, before love, before what I have now. If you subscribe to the idea that where you’ve been leads to where you are, well, they can keep all my stuff...