Stockholm, Sweden

My mother filed my childhood drawings with her tax papers

Dear Delyara, My mother is moving into a smaller apartment, and I am sorting decades of paperwork with her. She has never been sentimental. She throws flowers away before they wilt and thinks greeting cards are clutter. Today, inside a folder labelled TAX 1993, I found a drawing I made at age six of our family as three enormous heads with legs. Behind it was another. Then another. Apparently, Mum hid my drawings among important documents because that was the one place she knew she would never accidentally throw them away. I asked why she never told me she kept them. She said, “Why would I tell you? They were mine.” Fair enough. One picture shows Mum with purple hair because I had lost the brown crayon. She said it is the best she ever looked. We spent an hour going through them instead of sorting taxes. I have accused my mother many times of being emotionally practical. Today, I discovered she preserved my entire early artistic career between receipts and government forms. Some parents put love on walls. Mine apparently considered it confidential financial documentation.