So, why have I kept my prom dress from 1968?  The worn out T-Shirt from the first Strawberry Music Festival? My husband Rick’s Little League baseball shirt?

And what about that cute little skirt that barely covers my right thigh? Certainly it no longer would cover anything that it was supposed to cover. But when I opened Box #14 and held it up, a flood of memories washed over me.

I was 18, just starting my freshman year of college. The wild excitement of being on my own was heady, like some delicious intoxication. I strutted under the canopy of giant sycamore trees, passed Hallowed Halls of Learning.  On that Fall morning I sported a wool plaid pleated skirt. The pleats swung with the rhythm of my step. The hemline, daring those college boys to look, stopped a few inches above my knee.  My stride, strong and filled with drunken confidence. It was all in that skirt.

How can I pass it on?  How can I just toss out such a powerful image of stepping into the prime of my life?  I need a system. There are some things that I’m just not ready to give away or throw away. And I think that skirt is one of them.

Don’t worry:  I’m not planning to starve myself into wearing it again.  I have the letters P.D. behind my name–Practical Dreamer. So, while I long to be that size 6 and wear that skirt again, I’m practical. The dream is not about being that young thing with those really cute, sexy legs (Oh, they were cute!).  It’s about conjuring that feeling of complete Wild Independent Woman Power, for me first truly expressed in those early days of college.

There we were, free of our parents’ eyes, free from high school’s pressures.  But more importantly, free to let our flaming creative intellect ignite incredible sparks of passion, of discovery, of life’s immeasurable possibilities.  For me going to college was the most exciting new beginning of all! (A decade later that moment was dwarfed by motherhood.)

That glorious moment!  I found it again, tucked into the folds of a navy blue, sanguine red and golden yellow pleated wool skirt.

The stuff in boxes triggers these bright illuminations of a life.  Like yours, my life is sweetly, beautifully ordinary.  No Academy Awards, no New York Times Bestsellers’ List, No spot on Oprah–Just waking up each day putting one foot in front of the other.

Well, I guess I’ll go take a peak into Box #15.  I wonder what mystery lies within?

And to my dear Lizzy Restivo and Sofie Segerstrom…Good adventures, dear girls, as you take off for college this month. xoxoxo.