April, 2005
when she was very young

I must have carried the parts of the blender displayed here for at least a couple of years in my bag. They were the pieces that remained of our blender when it was left unattended on a hot plate that was supposed to be off, but apparently wasn't. Numerous phone calls led me to the warehouse when I was supposed to be able to purchase the parts that had melted, but each visit there ended with me being told "soon", until finally I was told that the particular item in question was no longer being imported. I suppose that it would have made sense back then to dispose of these pieces, but I continued to hold on to them.

For how long? Very long. We purchased our microwave oven when Hila was a baby. The boys' bottles were warmed on the same hot plate that melted the blender pieces. As were Hila's first bottles. And that means that Hila, eight years old as of this month, was probably no older than three months old when I started carrying these pieces around with me. I apparently continued to hope that one day I'd come across leftover pieces of the particular model I needed. But of course I never did.

It was also around this time that what seems to have become an obsession with scanning everyday objects took its hold on me. I didn't yet have a scanner at home (and certainly not a digital camera), so I would sneak various unsavory objects outside of the house and bring them to work where, when nobody was looking, I'd digitize them.