The Everyday Vase
The vase was just always there—one of those objects so woven into the fabric of my childhood that it feels more like memory than matter. I remembered it perched on my mother’s dresser when I was small, its wild colors outshining everything around it. My grandmother claimed it came from Nepal; my mother swore she found it at a thrift store in New Jersey. I used to search it secretly, hoping to spot a faded Made in China stamp hidden beneath the glaze. No matter its origin, it became a kind of family relic. It held peonies, then sunflowers, then nothing at all—migrating from shelf to shelf, house to house, collecting dust and decades in equal measure.
When I asked my mother why she kept it, she just shrugged. “It fits flowers,” she said. “What else does a vase need to do?” But I think we both knew that wasn’t it.
When she died, it was one of the only things I took from the house without second-guessing. Everything else felt too complicated, too heavy. The vase, though—it had always just been. No big story, no heavy sentiment. Just presence. Quiet, consistent, undemanding presence.
I didn’t use it for a long time. It sat on my bookshelf, empty—a placeholder for a feeling I hadn’t figured out yet. Then, one spring, my daughter came home from school with a handful of wildflowers clutched in her sticky fist. “These are for you, maman,” she said. I looked around and smiled when I saw the vase. It winked at me, like it had been waiting all along.
Now it sits on our kitchen island. It still has that chip, still wears the odd swirl of color that makes it impossible to categorize. It still doesn’t match anything, and yet matches everything. But it fits flowers. And, somehow, it fits us. One day, I’ll box it up and give it to my daughter when she heads off to college. Maybe she’ll put wildflowers in it, or maybe it’ll just sit quietly on her bookshelf, catching dust and light. Either way, I’ll write a note to go with it. Nothing elaborate—just a simple reminder:
“It doesn’t have to be fancy. It just has to hold what matters.”
