No one threw them away despite the fact that whoever originally owned them did not find them useful. They’re also not used but, very importantly, they were KEPT. I can’t remember where I found them–probably at a flea market or estate sale. Plus, a dime for bobby pins was not that cheap, considering you could buy a burger for a quarter in the late ’50s. I’d date these from the 1950s-early 1960s, based on the line drawing and the two-color printing. That’s a giant flip off to you, Chick-Fil-A … ![]() Up today is Gay Bobbie Pins from Gay Products in Atlanta. Pouring through it can also be fun as hell. The “junk drawer” says more about human psychology than a metric ton of self-help books. Each piece captivates us, challenges us and ultimately enriches our understanding of ourselves and the world we live in. Each piece causes us to reevaluate our view of the past and our position in the system that created it. Each piece invites us to use our imagination, our sense of empathy, our sense of communication. I have traveled with some of these pieces and used them in talks, lectures and book signings, as I believe in the power of physical touch, of interaction with an object, to better understand and literally feel the connection we all have to what has come before us, whether it was a century, a decade or a week ago. This is stuff, mostly inexpensive originally, that survived the ravages of time without any certain purpose or agenda. So, starting today, I’ve decided to document some of the ephemera that I use for inspiration. “Time capsules” buried fifty years ago don’t reveal the past–they reveal how the people in control of those capsuled wanted people in the future to remember the past. Writers have always embellished and propagandized … but pottery fragments rarely lie because they were not purposely placed or arranged. Archaeology was a focus of mine while earning a Master’s Degree in Classics, and I’m one of those academics who support archaeology as an overall more trustworthy record than the written one. One of the major tools I use to “channel” the past is by examining what it left behind–a sort of latter-day archaeology. ![]() I try reach a point where I feel as though I recognize and understand that human truth, whenever it took place, and then write it so that my readers understand it, too. I want to know what someone thought and felt, what they experienced, how they enjoyed and how they endured. I’ve always been fascinated with history because I am fascinated with people. It lives, somewhere, in someone’s memories … and if those memories were written down or spoken aloud–or commemorated in some way or shape or form–we who were NOT there, who did NOT share that particular bit of history-as-memory–can kinda sorta participate in it, too. And like yesterday, it has memory and feeling and life beyond that of a date or time or place recorded in a record or newspaper. The thing is, “history” is as recent as yesterday. My next novel, for example, is set in 1985, making it the first book I’ve written set in an era in which I actually lived. As a writer, I am most noted for historical works–though as I and the world get older, history becomes more “wait–I was there” memory.
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