I’ve posted a photograph of a key ring and its scattered collection of keys. They are interesting keys. By interesting, I mean that—save one—I no longer remember what any of them are for. I keep them in the glovebox of my truck, as I have in each truck I’ve owned since the mid-1980s. The one key I still use belongs to a 40-year-old padlock that secures a shed at the lakefront.
The others are ghost keys—keys to
toolboxes that no longer exist, doors long out of reach, and padlocks that have
long since rusted into memory.
Until yesterday, it never occurred to
me that I should peel the ghost keys away. Doing so proved surprisingly
poignant. It felt as if I were shrinking my life in some quiet, tangible
way—letting go of places and things that once mattered deeply to me.
—Mitchell Hegman
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