
e•phem•er•a 1. something that is transitory and without lasting significance 2. a range of collectable items that were originally designated to be short-lived
I have a secret, long-time love affair with ephemera.
If you traveled back in time with me and rummaged through one of the bedroom closets from my childhood, we would find shoe boxes (neatly stacked, of course) filled with cast-offs and found objects.
Plastic flower pieces. (Yes, I grew up in the plastic flower era.) Broken bits of jewelry. Belt buckles. Assorted rocks and seashells. Coins from mysterious foreign lands. (Okay, Canadian coins from across the river.) Bits of lace and embroidery thread. Odd buttons. Aluminum foil scraps and colored tissue paper. And a clothespin or two.
If we fast-forward to one of my bedroom closets, say around the age of sixteen, we would find bigger boxes with cast off clothing.
Grandma Doll’s crocheted aprons. (Waiting to be converted to vests and halter-tops.) Mom’s 50’s pearl-buttoned sweaters and jackets. (Waiting to be worn with my favorite hip-hugger bell bottom jeans – the pair with the chessboard appliqué on the butt stitched by yours truly.) Grandma Smith’s Greta Garbo-esque satin wedding dress. (Too precious to cut up but a definite inspiration.) An older cousin’s 40’s taffeta and organdy party dress. Gloves in assorted shades of white to ivory. A black Cossack-style coat. And a velvet hand-beaded by somebody in the family purse.
If we fast-forward just a little more, we’d find a freshly married Bernadette merging with life in the fast lane – a life that left her no time for the magical meanderings ephemera encouraged.
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“The creation story portrays the love of a creative God lifting beauty and order out of the chaos.” – Sr. Macrina Weiderkehr O.S.B.
Now, lets visit one more Bernadette. The one who, when swept to the curb, scrambled to salvage bits of her broken dreams before they (more…)




















