08/31/2026
There are objects we keep because they are useful.
And then there are the others.
- The chipped bowl that belonged to your mother.
- The little wooden thing your child made at school.
- A book with somebody’s handwriting inside the cover.
- A piece of furniture that makes absolutely no sense in your house, but somehow leaving it behind would feel worse.
I have become increasingly fascinated by these objects, not because they are valuable. Often they aren’t. But because somewhere along the way they stopped being *things* and became containers for people, places, versions of ourselves, and lives we once lived.
When I left South Africa, I learned how strange it is to decide what gets to come with you. You can replace a chair, but you cannot necessarily replace what that chair remembers.
That idea has found its way into my sculptures, into *Soul Decor*, and increasingly into the conversations I am having with people who tell me about the objects they have carried through marriages, moves, deaths, immigration, children leaving home and whole lives changing shape.
Tomorrow evening, September 1,(6-7pm) I’ll be at the Halifax Central library talking about The Objects We Keep — and why the ordinary things around us can sometimes tell us more about who we are than the things we deliberately choose to say about ourselves.
I suspect most of us have at least one object we would grab before something considerably more expensive. I’d love to know yours.
If you are in Halifax, come and join me on September 1, from 6-7 pm.
