Loree Sandler

Of Burros and Brothers

When my parents bought a second home, in Colorado, my mother amassed Navajo rugs, leather chaps, iron horses. As an art consultant and museum docent her eye was well-trained. Everything was interesting.

But the ten-dollar find from a dusty old shop was dayenu. A little stuffed burro, sporting a bell and Michigan bib, straddles a felted brimmed hat. Loopy machine stitching proclaims: Worlds Champion Burro Race. Of all the objects, in all the rooms, in all the house, that hat had me at hello. What can I say? The heart wants what it wants.

Colorado was our favorite escape. Skiing, hiking, hunting for crawfish, posing on ponies – my boys were reared in the Rockies.

We tried every restaurant from Avon to Edwards, perused every store. We braved the potholed road to Piney Lake.

When my brother’s family overlapped, it was chaos, and crumbs, and piles of dirty clothes. It was also warm cookies and hot cocoa.

Eventually our parents sold the house, and my father, who called himself “burro” long before the hat, packed, and schlepped, and shut the place down. My brother bought a house up the road and took possession of much of the stuff – furniture to bedding, dishes to decor.

Leftovers were sold, or shipped, and stacked in my basement.

Todd’s place was an investment with renters, and when we finally visited, well, there was the hat.

“I thought you were giving it to me,” I complained to our parents.

“Of course,” Mom confirmed. “But I wasn’t there when Dad packed.”

Our parents have given us the shirts off their backs. I could not make a stink for an ass.

We’ve downsized twice since the pandemic began. Many beloved objects stored indefinitely out of sight. I have so much more stuff than I need.

Todd’s family traded up in Colorado, then traded up again. They’re forever looking forward while I’m forever dreaming back. Deeply nostalgic last winter I dared to ask for the hat.

“Sorry,” Todd said. “Jana really likes it.”

I called Mom with the news, but she already knew. Todd had called her hopping mad. Apparently, I’d asked once before.

“Really?” I repeated, unable to remember.

“Anyway, it’s ridiculous,” she agreed. “A stranger could walk away with it, and no one would notice.”

A week later, Todd called Dad. “I’ll give Loree the hat if you give me the box.”

The studded, leather stagecoach box is valuable, but that’s beside the point.

“Don’t you dare,” I brayed. Our parents kept so few objects from that house for themselves.

The burro does not bode well. Someday there will be an estate to divide.

This fall Mom confided, “I thought they’d give you the hat for your birthday.”

“They’ve ruined it for me,” I half-lied.

Manufactured as a souvenir, the burro has morphed from folk art to totem. It’s a reminder of our time together, in a house filled with beauty, when my children were molded in the mountains. Yet the bell tolls another tale, too, of a hole in the fabric of our family.

“Dear Loree & Bob, Greetings from Telluride & Happy Hannukah, xoxo Todd & Jana”

Without fanfare, the box arrived on my doorstep. Like many epic events, the Worlds Champion Burro Race took an unexpected turn. The hat now lives in my home. Generosity? Pity? Too shabby for new mountain digs?

Mom said, “I bought six hat stands when Barney’s went out of business.”

“I’d love one,” I admitted. “You still collecting hats?”

Ian, Spencer, Graham (& burro), Beaver Creek, Colorado 2003(?)