I was putting away dishes a couple of days ago when I noticed that the wire loops on my littlest whisk, the one I use to mix honey into homemade chai, were more rust than silver.

“How can that be?” I thought. “It isn’t that old.”

I thought back to when I received that whisk as part of a larger gift. It came from one of my oldest friends who included it in a butter-colored cookie jar, apples and grapes painted on its sides. That jar has been on our counter ever since … well … it was a wedding gift, and we are quickly coming up on our twentieth anniversary.

OK. So it turns out my “not that old” little whisk is older than our son, our dog, our cat, our cars. In fact, it has traveled from North Dakota to Washington and back to Minnesota. It has “lived” in eight houses. How long should a whisk be expected to perform its duties?

As I have been unpacking our household, post-move, I’ve been struck time and again how I regard certain relatively old objects as “new” or as “recent acquisitions.” Is it because the meaning of “new” is changing — stretching — as I grow older? Or is there another reason? (Is this just me?)

Do you have an object in your life that you regard or treat as new, that others would not see the same way? What is it? Why is it still new to you? What is its history, really?

What is your history, really?

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