What is your oldest, best thing?
an interview series for kids and other curious people
(this year, I wore my jacket once—to an outdoor play)
In Judith Kerr’s children’s book Mog and Bunny, Mog is a forgetful cat who one day gets a pink bunny toy as a present. She immediately rips Bunny’s ears off, but he’s still a really great toy. “She played with him… and played with him… and played… and played… and played with him. He was her best thing.” He gets really dirty and gross, and the parents keep threatening to throw him in the dustbin. One night, when a thunderstorm interrupts the family’s barbecue, Mog stays outside, because Bunny is out there too, trapped under a grill tool. The children have to rescue the irreplaceable Bunny to get Mog to come inside.
I’ve been thinking about “best things” and how our best things are not usually our newest things. When we visited my parents last month, after we were all vaccinated, my mom got up from the dinner table to answer the door. “Oh, that’s Ed,” my dad told me. “He’s fixing Papa’s lawnmower.” It turns out that my mom still uses my grandfather (Papa’s) lawnmower, and she was having the engine repaired and the wheels replaced. I have no idea how long Papa had that lawnmower, because he was known to keep and repair everything.
We teased him about that, but it’s actually really good for the environment to use old things, to keep stuff, to repair things that might work with a little TLC. Just take clothing, as one example (I don’t remember Papa mending clothes, but he wasn’t exactly a clotheshorse either). In 2000, a single year, 50 billion new garments were made; last year, in 2020, that number had doubled. How much is double? (100 billion!).
Can you imagine why it would be a problem to make 100 billion new jeans, t-shirts, dresses, and socks in a year? (Can you even picture 100 billion socks?)
If you were thinking that it’s a problem because it will be hard to store all those clothes, you’re right. Some clothes wind up in a landfill, some get burned (making more pollution). Even worse, a lot of microfibers (tiny tiny threads from things like athletic clothes and fleeces) wind up in our oceans and rivers, just because we wash them in our washing machines! They pollute the water we drink, and hurt fish and other wildlife, too.
Plus, it takes many, many gallons of water to produce clothing—just to grow the cotton needed to make a single pair of jeans takes 1,800 gallons of water (that’s enough water for one person to drink for more than five years!). Many of the dyes used to make clothes are harmful to the environment, and then you have sewing them, advertising them, storing and shipping them …
It’s no wonder the fashion industry is responsible for 10% of our global carbon emissions (the pollution that is making Earth warmer).
And then you have all the other stuff… lawn mowers! Phones! Coffee makers! Toys! Cat toys! All those little plastic things they give you at school to try to get you to donate money!
I don’t know about you, but it’s stressful to me to think about all the stuff I consume. I want to consume less, and enjoy what I have.
That’s where I got the idea for the “oldest, best thing,” an activity that asks you to interview someone about their oldest, best thing. This is the object you’ve had a long, long time, and that you couldn’t replace. Something you’d wait outside in a rainstorm with, while rain was “dripping… off [your] nose.” It’s interesting to find out what that would be with someone you know! Or to think of the answer yourself!
Bea interviewed her Mamie about her oldest, best thing, then she interviewed me.
Bea & Mamie
Bea: What is your oldest, best thing?
Mamie: Grandpa!
Bea: You can’t say Grandpa. It has to be a thing.
Mamie: Then I think it would be my silver napkin rings and a tiny silver knife, fork, and spoon set.
Bea: Where did you get it?
Mamie: I inherited it from my parents, who inherited it from my grandmother. The silver rattle has toothmarks from a lot of babies in our family, including you!
Bea: Is that safe, Mamie?
Mamie: Hmmm.
Bea: Do you still use your oldest, best thing? Why do you like it?
Mamie: I do! We use the napkin rings every day, and when Harriet and Charlie visit, they eat with the silverware. I like it because it’s from my family.
Bea: Do you do anything special to take care of it?
Mamie: I polish it, and I never put it in the dishwasher.
Bea & Belle
Belle: *rummaging in the closet* Here it is! My oldest, best thing!
Bea: That’s a nice jacket.
Belle: Thank you! I got it in Los Angeles when I was 24. It was old then! I bought it from a thrift store. I still remember that it was $40, which I thought was a lot, but I loved it so much that I splurged.
Bea: Tell me about it.
Belle: Well, it’s blue velvet, with gold buttons. It’s made by Yves Saint Laurent, who was a famous French designer. I think it’s from the 1970s, but I’m not sure.
Bea: Why do you like it?
Belle: It fits perfectly, and it has a nice cut, like a jacket Frog would wear from Frog and Toad. It’s also a little bit fancy, because it’s velvet, but not too fancy.
Bea: It has good pockets. But the lining is ripped.
Belle: It is! I used to wear this jacket a lot, but now I only wear it a few times a year. I might get the lining repaired, if I can find someone to do it.
Bea: Could you replace it? Like, at the mall or a store?
Belle: No—sadly. Or maybe not sadly? It’s special to have something for such a long time. I’m glad I have it.
So, what is your oldest, best thing? In Bea’s Zoom writing club tomorrow, we’re going to interview each other about our oldest, best things, then write about them. (If you’d like to join us, you are welcome--just email me: belleboggs@gmail.com! Writing club is at 2:30 on Wednesdays on Zoom. Sometimes—when Bea takes over—it gets a little wild, FYI). If you can’t be in writing club, you can still interview someone and send a photo to us. We’ll publish your oldest, best thing interview next week!
Here are some questions to get you started:
Name:
Item:
Where did you get it?
How old is it?
Why do you like it?
How do you take care of it?
Do you think it could be replaced with something new? Why or why not?
I wanted to respond to this post so much but the only things I would items old or new that I would grab to save and hold onto in the pouring rain are Ben's baby blanket and the last photograph taken of him. It would make for pretty heavy, depressing reading so I decided to refrain. I read the FTT faithfully. I love you both.