Item Number 24: Metal Piggy-Bank

Time in possession: In excess of 20 years

Description: Bronze metal piggy bank, comes apart into two pieces, formerly held together by a notch and a hole with a small screw (screw now missing). Now held together with physics and faith. Current contents a undetermined amount of American change.

Cost: Another gift. I honestly couldn't tell you how much this bank was worth, as I'm pretty sure it was a baby gift. I'm gonna say 15 bucks because it's a pretty solid bank that has served me well. Plus it's a cute little pig.

Story: A little bit about how I currently do entries for the site: First of all I take a bunch of pictures on a digital camera, after which I import them to my computer and crop/resize them. Finally I upload each of the pictures into a separate draft on blogger. Doing all this takes a couple of hours, but allows me to get a decent amount of entries set up for the next step, being the part when, when I find myself with the time, I can log onto blogger and begin writing about whatever item is next in the cue. This is actually pretty fun because I'm often surprised by the items that pop up and at the very least I'm never sure as to what I'm going to be writing about when I open one of my un-named drafts. It's a good writing exercise and to me at least keeps the project a little bit more exciting then it would be otherwise.

So, when this little guy came up, I was shocked to realize that while he's been in my life a good long while, I really have no stories about him except to say that as a childhood item I would never think of getting rid of him. I actually have a collection of banks (4 banks, which used to be 5 until I gave my ceramic Elephant bank away to a girlfriend) all of which have been in my possession as long as I can remember. The nice thing about this guy is that since he's pretty tough, when I was younger he could often be used when playing with my action figures. I believe his most frequent use was as a prison (Try to escape from this one, GI Joe!) but occasionally he would be split in two and used as two boats. What can I say, I never had an appropriate boat accessory.

The funniest thing about an item like this is that even looking at the picture is intensely comforting. Seeing it reminds me of home, and my room, and comfort. It's a little detail, something of scant significance, but it's longevity in my life has given it new worth in my eyes. I would never call it a prized possession and for that matter I might not notice for a long time if it should disappear, but I couldn't bear the thought of deliberately parting with it. I guess I'm just a really materialistic guy.