Not Just an Old Trunk

I found this trunk at a roadside flea market. Driving by, I saw it, had to turn around and go back to investigate further. I love vintage finds and this rates up there as one of my favorites. I wish it could talk. I am sure there is a story inside waiting to be discovered.

There are initials on the side: I.H.H.
Are these the owner's? The manufacturer?
Maybe this trunk belonged to Ivy Helena Hampton, or Ivan Horatio Hanson.
Where did it come from?
Did it travel in the bottom of an ship, bound for Ellis Island and the hopes and dreams that awaited the owner there? Did it get tossed onto the docks carelessly by a dock hand, heedlessly unaware of the precious cargo it may have contained?

What was locked inside, folded and layered carefully? Maybe it was a lifetime of belongings that had to be condensed to fit inside one steamer trunk. A wedding gown, a baby's shoe, an heirloom pocket watch that no longer kept time, a favorite book with ragged edges that had already been read many times, or faded daguerreotypes that captured a moment in time, a frozen expression that the owner did not want to forget. 

Maybe the trunk held the makings of a future and a hope of survival in a new country. Tools to begin again. Or to start over.

Details. I love the details, the workmanship that went into the making of this trunk. I like the feeling that someone cared. Do I put half as much attention to detail in whatever I am doing? Or do I just want to get the job done? 

 

I like to open the lid and smell the dusty, musty scent of history. The owner of this trunk had a life. They breathed, they laughed, they cried, they took care of their family, they worked, they may have married and had children. I don't know who they were, but I have a little sense of them in what they have left behind. 

It makes me wonder, what will I leave behind? Will I be a mystery to someone, will they wonder who I was, how I lived, what I lived for? 

I think that's one of the reasons I like this trunk so much. It makes me ponder my own life and what I am doing with it. It makes me want to tell my story, to be an inspiration to others. Am I just going to keep the lid shut or am I going to dare to open it?

Love,

Dianne