Tumble Bucket

How my mother's pragmatism grew my imagination.

There was a drawer in my childhood kitchen dedicated to bits of aluminum foil and rubber bands. There were used birthday candles, meant to be redeployed down to teeny-weeny nub-dom. My mother believed in repurposing everything, ergo, my tumble bucket.

The tumble bucket was first a cookie tin, with rosebuds painted on it and a bright red lid. Inside, a serendipitous mishmash of things like shells from broken necklaces and Canadian pennies and single earrings (she wore clip-ons, so earring loss was frequent). My favorite piece was an intact faux diamond necklace that my mother considered too gaudy. While the necklace was the belle of the tumble bucket, I had other pet pieces, like the lace-trimmed embroidered handkerchief with my great aunt’s monogram on it and a pewter mouse with one gaping eye socket and one sparkly fake ruby eye.

Up until I started kindergarten my mother insisted I take a daily nap. At one p.m. she would sit me on my bed, hand over the tumble bucket, and close the door behind her. For years I stayed there for an hour and a half without ever once falling asleep.    

I didn’t mind. I began casting the tumble bucket ensemble the second the door closed. The faux diamond necklace was always the star and, to be honest, kind of a diva, making grand entrances and landing the prince (a knight from my brother’s old chess set or the silver mouse, depending on my whim) or saving the tumble bucket community from disasters, generally natural, with earthquakes being a favorite.

Basically, I was working on stories before I could even write. My tumble bucket dramas comprised a traditional narrative arc, with character introduction, world-building, climax, and resolution. Some days I got so engrossed the story I was spinning that I lost myself entirely. My mother’s voice saying nap time was over felt like being shaken in the midst of a wonderful dream.

As a kid, you don’t have control over most of the stuff you do, including nap time, so I made my alone time, mine alone. I had been given a space of solitude and my tumble bucket. Free of distractions, without screens or adults, left to my own devices, I set to work, and never stopped.