Emptying the Box

Want, Need, Know

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Move was a word I knew. It wasn’t foreign or scary, we had done it so much.

This time I was given a small box.

You can only bring the things you most want, things that fit neatly in this box.

I began the task not fully understanding why.

I understood the word want, maybe more strongly than I understood move.

The box filled quickly, with things I knew I wanted still left outside it.

I tried again.

Then the instructions became more detailed.

Not that, I didn’t give you that.

Not that, it’s broken.

I didn’t understand that a broken thing couldn’t be wanted.

I emptied the box and started over.

I began to wish for a bigger box, when I was told to hurry.

When I began to hurry I got confused.

Hands not mine took things I wasn’t confused about and removed them from the box.

The box that was mine to fill with things I wanted became a box where things I wanted might disappear.

When the thing I wanted most, a thing that was a word I didn’t know yet–cherished– was snatched from the box and thrown in the garbage, the box became a thing to fear.

I ran outside, away from the box.

A voice said “You better fill that box, or you’ll have nothing.”

I began to pick up sticks from the yard.

I could throw sticks, break sticks, pretend the sticks were other things.

I filled the box with them.

It was the first time I heard a laugh and knew it wasn’t really a laugh.

And the last time I ever called something mine.

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