The things
we keep.*

Everyday objects, 24 different ways to begin. These are fictional sample stories to inspire your own. Real photographs. Imagined histories.

On letting go

The key that opens nothing.

Nobody remembers the door. Nobody is ready to throw away the key.

Step inside

Proof of a little happiness

A receipt from a very good day.

The ink is fading. The afternoon isn’t.

Step inside

A domestic institution

The mug nobody else is allowed to use.

A perfectly ordinary mug. A very strict ownership policy.

Step inside

A study in remembrance

The hours between.

It stopped telling the time. It never stopped bringing him back.

Step inside

In somebody’s handwriting

No particular news.

Nothing much had happened. She wrote anyway.

Step inside

An imperfect record

Just one more.

Half the photographs were blurred. We kept every one.

Step inside

Unfinished business

Still a few pages left.

Shopping lists, big plans, and one very good idea at the back.

Step inside

A first step

The interview shoes.

They knew the way in before I did.

Step inside

A small soundtrack

Side B is for the way home.

The radio presenter kept talking over the beginning.

Step inside

From the kitchen

A measure of enough.

Her recipe always began with “you’ll know.”

Step inside

Small adventures

A thousand carpet miles.

The sofa was a mountain. The hallway went on forever.

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Brought home

A pocketful of the seaside.

We were allowed to bring home just one.

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A living keepsake

Against all expectations.

The care instructions were optimistic about my abilities.

Step inside

Household law

Not for paper.

Everyone in the house knew the rule. Almost everyone followed it.

Step inside

In plain sight

Have you seen my glasses?

A small mystery with a remarkably consistent ending.

Step inside