Tell us Tuesday is a weekly question and answer feature… I throw out a question on a frugal topic, and you answer! Feel free to leave any links to posts that you’ve written in the topic in your comments.
When we had our break-in a few months ago, they took both our laptops and my cellphone. It was a huge hassle, dealing with the police and the insurance- in fact we still haven’t been reimbursed. It’s also been difficult dealing with all the information that was stolen; I’m still trying to recreate my records.
But I am so relieved that my most valuable possessions weren’t touched. Without even talking about things without monetary value like family photos, the thieves didn’t take anything that has both financial and emotional value. I was especially relieved to find that my jewelry (mostly sentimental stuff) wasn’t touched, and my husband was hugely relieved that his five guitars weren’t stolen. All together, my pearls and his instruments are worth about €5,000 monetarily… but so much more sentimentally!
How much are your most emotionally valuable possessions worth?
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{ 7 comments }
My MVP’s (most valuable possessions) are worth nothing monetarily. My husband and I had a charcoal picture drawn of the two of us back in ’98, when we first started dating, and I have it framed over my mantle. That, and Leila’s stuff, would be the first non-living things I would grab in case of a housefire.
Isn’t it funny that often our most valuable things are worthless to anyone else but us? Maybe that’s what makes them MVP’s to us?
My most valuable things are my family photos. I’m a planner and often think about, “What if. . .”. I have a special place where I keep all of my photo albums and baby memorabilia. I thought that if there were a fire I would be able to grab up everything, neat and tidy, and escape. Well, we had a house fire 7 years ago and unfortunately I was downstairs and couldn’t get upstairs to my “special place”. Fortunately there was only smoke damage upstairs, and everything was fine. But the best thing was that our cat was outside at the time and I was the only one home and ran out into the yard. The fire could have broken out during the night, and the outcome might have been very different!
Family photos, a few books, a few pieces of jewelry, though the two items that matter the most to me–my great, great grandmother’s bloodstone ring and my grandmother’s diamond engagement ring–I wear all the time, so they probably wouldn’t get stolen unless I was mugged. I wasn’t happy when my laptop was stolen, but I eventually recovered all the records and got a new laptop.
The most painful break-in I ever had was when I was in my middle twenties. They stole my portable electric typewriter and a strongbox full of diaries I’d kept since I was ten, and every paper I did in college, both as an undergraduate and graduate student. The appeal to the thief was that the box was locked. The culprit got no financial gain from it, but I still wish I had it back.
My wedding album can not be replaced. The photographer didn’t keep the negatives (this was before digital photography really caught on) and I haven’t scanned it in. I’m not sure someone would want to steal it, but I would hate for it to be destroyed in a flood or fire.
My photos are all online, so I’m not worried about those. My wedding ring can be replaced, I love it love it love it, but it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary.
I think the worst thing we could lose to theft would be our servers. They have all the backups of all our computers ever. Terabytes worth of information.
We really don’t have much of monetary value – LOL! Just information and memories.
My MVPs (non living) would have to be the items that I saved from our wedding, my bouquet (it was handmade by a friend), husband's Boutonniere, my garter (handmade by my mom), and a couple of the favors. The baby book for my son.
Most of my pictures are digital anyway, except for old ones. I'd like to get all of those scanned just in case something happens. I'm not big on jewelry but I do have a pink ice ring that my grandmother gave to me when I was a teenager.
.-= Ashley´s last blog ..Money Maker – You Data =-.
After an acquaintance’s house burned down and many of my friends lost so much in Hurricane Katrina, I have pondered on this subject often. I have a fire-safe safe to keep important papers in and years ago when I was living the apartment life, I gave the one really valuable piece of jewelry I had to my mother to put in their safety deposit box — we now live on separate sides of the country and I would never wear the piece that belonged to my grandmother, but I know it’s safe.
The things that matter most to me, what worries me most when I think about tragedy occurring at my home, is danger to my 2 cats and my precious Pug. The very thought makes me want to race home and grab them all up and hug them.
I hate to be without my things. I need my computer to do my job. I need my cel phone to communicate. I need my t.v. so I have company on the weekends. I need my Vitamix and my car, etc. But they’re just things. They’re replaceable. My cats and my Pug are only going to be on this earth for a moment in my life.
.-= J. Lynne´s last blog ..The Eat-Only-What’s-In-My-Pantry-For-A-Month Diet =-.
I think I may have mentioned this in a comment before, but this past fall our house burned down. I can safely say that I have no possession that I couldn’t do without. It was REALLY hard in the days after, pointlessly sorting through the charred remains of our material life, but it showed me that every necessary item (furniture, clothes) is completely fungible and that the sentimental items are only mementos of the sentiment, which no disaster (or thief) can take away from me.
After receiving the call from a neighbor, knowing that my partner was out of the house as well, my only concern was for our cats. Every little doodad that I’d treasured was meaningless compared to those sweet little fuzzies. The experience has greatly changed my relationship with STUFF–for the better.
P.S. Don’t worry about the cats, because they’re geniuses and a very good Samaritan lives on our street. They ripped a hole in the box spring of the bed on the other side of the house from where the fire started and crawled inside. The unknown person who called the fire department knew that animals lived in our house (they love to sit in the windows and meow at passers-by), and told the firemen to watch out for them. They escaped with just some scorched paws and very sooty snouts.