Kay McCabe

Inheritance is a photographic memoir that ruminates on family, culture and our relationship to the things we keep. 

We all have stuff that has been given to us from our ancestors. The question is, what do you with it all? Do you use it, store it, give it away? What began as an exercise in downsizing quickly became a reflection on my family’s ethos.  As I rummaged, I heard lessons from my parents and realized that each object had a story to tell. Creative, industrious and loving, my family was also bound by an oppressive social code. Some items I cherish and others are a burden to save, yet tossing them feels as if I am abandoning my past. 

I have found myself in a rush of memories, some crystal clear and some murky with time. The old green chair that belonged to my father as a boy, too small and too low to be practical, still sits proudly right by the woodstove. Broken sewing machines, used by my mother to dress her five children gather dust in the closet. Her paintings, his ruby red wine glasses, my grandfather’s ornate dishes from a lost generation, wedding photos, baby photos, outdated anatomical drawings and history books- the list of things goes on and on. Each object tells a story and connects the past to the present. 

My children are not going to want these heirlooms, yet purging is more difficult than I thought.  Like all good memoirs, I hope this reflection resonates.