Buckets of Love
The depth of the ordinary
May she rest in peace.
As of October 28, 2024, my Dad’s sweet 1970’s mustard-colored pail has earned her eternal rest.
Like many of us, she finally got tired, and her body could no longer sustain her spirit. She was fully used up in the best of ways, and had a (fraternal?) twin in avocado green who perished before her, circa 2019.
She was not my favorite color, this golden harvest, and yet I came to love her deeply because color does not speak to nuance, depth, purpose, reinvention, contribution, and so much more. In fact, I only just noticed the swirls beneath her surface (third pic)
when snapping these photos. Why had I not looked below the surface before now? And am I really talking about buckets here?
She contributed to our family lore in many tiny, ordinary ways:
Storm window washer
Torn terry-cloth rag holder
Pinecone gatherer
Cleaning supplies container
Paint brush soaker
Vat o’ suds and soft-bristled tire brush
Wooden clothes pin holder
Kiddo’s Halloween bucket 2016-2024
For decades, she lived in a stack of other utility vessels, tucked away onto a dusty third-tier shelf in my parents’ garage. Faded red apple baskets, tall canary yellow cylinders with pour spouts, chubby white buckets with red rollers on the handles, short squat pails, blue-speckled foam coolers for fishing…they all lived together. Gosh, lots of memories of places and people and love. All from a bucket.
This bucket is not my Dad. Ce n’est pa mon Père. But I sure cried like she was when I said goodbye on Monday. ❤️
10/28/2024: Five years, one month, one day after Dad’s death