Welcome to the monthly edition of Where Bloggers Live. It’s kind of like HGTV’s “Celebrities at Home,” but…Bloggers! Who doesn’t like to peek behind the scenes and see inside people’s homes? Every month a group of six bloggers share their workspaces, homes, towns, and more!

This month’s theme is “I Can’t Let Go of ____.” You know, those things that are past their prime or beyond their usefulness that you just can’t let go of for sentimental reasons. I’m sure we all have them.

I feel like I could pick almost any item in my apartment and it would fall under the heading of “really past its prime but being held onto for sentimental reasons.”

So I’m going to pick one item that was from my mother, one from my father.

The Older Than Dirt Shirt

I’ve shared this before. A shirt my mother bought me from Macy’s prior to 1985 that I have worn frequently and continuously for the past 35+ years. It has magically adjusted to all my weights from the low 100s where I was in the early 80s, to the 300+ that I was a few years ago.

It has certainly seen better days. It has holes in it, paint splatters, one shoulder pad (proof of its 80s origin) is hanging on by a thread. But I still love it. The loose, drapey fit…the Henley neckline, the color…at this point, the fact that my mother bought it for me – all these factors have made it a long-time favorite. And I will probably have it til the end.

The White Bookcase

My father built this bookcase for my sister when she was around 10 years old (she’s in her 70s now). It’s just a square box, nothing fancy. But I’ve had it with me for as long as I can remember. I haven’t even repainted it in a REALLY long time, so it’s chippy…not in a pretty shabby chic Rachel Ashwell Paris apartment way, just in a “nobody really cares about me but I’ll just keep doing my best” kind of way.

I kind of like its white boxiness. It’s like the invisible black dress. You can put it anywhere, put anything on it, and it does the job without attracting attention to itself. And I have so few things of my father’s…and certainly nothing he built.

When we first moved to Long Island in the early 70s (well, 1969), he made this THING to go in the kitchen. It was part countertop dining, part storage, part display…I wish I had a picture of it. Like the white bookcase, it was very straightforward, its job was to serve, not to look pretty, and it did its job well. On it, he handpainted a little sign that either he or my mother framed, and it always leaned up on one of the shelves.” It said “The Thing Designed & Built by Rain.” His name was Charles but no one called him that. Everyone called him Rain.

I’m sure I’ve told the (“Bettye is a Dummy”) story before where I was walking down the hall in jr high school and a teacher I didn’t know asked me if my father was Charles Rainwater and I said no because…NO ONE ever called him that. It was only later that I was like, oh. Yeah. Duh.

So, the white bookcase will probably stay with me forever. It’s extremely sturdy. It’s 70ish years old, which is not THAT old for furniture, but he was not a furniture maker….and this has withstood MANY moves.

PS: I also still have the “The Thing Designed & Built by Rain” sign somewhere, too. That will probably always stay as well. I’ll have to tell Katie the story so she understands what it is someday when she’s going through my things.

I feel like I could write a book explaining what all my things are and their “historical” significance to me/my family, so that after I’m gone, Katie can at least know what things are before she just sends them to the dump (or wherever). That’s one of those “to do” things I will probably never do.

These are not exciting or beautiful or unique items. But they’ve traveled with me for a long time and feel like part of my story.

Be sure to visit my friends’ blogs today, as well…

Daenel at Living Outside the Stacks
Iris at Iris’ Original Ramblings
Jodie at Jodie’s Touch of Style
Leslie at Once Upon a Time Happily Ever After 
Em at Dust and Doghair