June 18, 2022
Sometime in the fall of 1991 Leeanna and I were walking through the Southland Mall and happened upon a vendor selling wicker products. I remember clearly a large selection of items in various colors strewn across the middle of the mall so, we stopped to look. There was a small group of products in green and purples and I commented how it matched the bed linens I had just put on my wedding registry. Leeanna offered to purchase a piece for my wedding gift. I was excited and chose a small waste paper basket.
On November 3, 1991 at a wedding shower, Leeanna gifted me that small waste paper basket and I packed in with all of the wedding gifts and headed off to marital bliss. I dutifully put it in our first apartment, in the bedroom, and admired my fine taste and thought kindly of my friend Leeanna. In just a few years my taste in bed linens changed and off they went to Goodwill but for whatever reason the waste paper basket stayed on. Over the next, nearly 31 years I would live in 9 different homes. With the exception of a few fancy candlesticks and clocks, all those wedding gifts would wear out or break or just get lost along the way. The marriage itself ended nearly six years ago!
Do you know what wedding gift lives on being used day after day for last 31 years - that green and purple wicker basket! I have come to love it because it’s been with me through so much. It’s a bit worn and hasn’t matched a thing since that first comforter but it lives proudly on in the life of Lynn Wood.
At this point, it’s till death do us part.
