If you know me or have read my blogs before, you know that I was left with boxes and totes full of “stuff” when my parents passed. I’ve experienced many moments of angst wondering why they would hold onto this junk. But I’ve also had many moments of thanksgiving that they held into all of these treasures.

Last month, I spent a week entertaining my quarantined self going through totes and boxes looking at each picture and reading letter after letter from parents and aunts and uncles and grandparents of my parents. It was an incredible journey as I was able to glimpse my parents as young adults and better understand their lives and the lives of all of those relatives who went before me paving the path for me.

I found these two small bottles in one of the totes and placed them on a shelf in my office. I kept them out, mainly because they were old/cute/tiny. Although I have no frame of reference and I cannot read the small print other than Spice…I was thrilled that one of them still holds perfume from the past. This morning I took the cap off of the empty bottle and the scent IS STILL THERE! I realized (with a weird sense of connection) that I was savoring the scent of a feminine ancestors passing me on a stairway in a different place and time.

I am grateful for the blessings in my life!