That being said, I would prefer not to have my whole personality be “girl who lost everything in the fires.” Did I purchase a literal tiny violin? MAYBE. (No one has ever been more committed to the bit than me, I assure you). But every time it comes up in conversation, there is this rapid succession of emotions: a kick of sadness followed by the immediate need to assure the other person that everything is actually fine (I am fine, this is fine, I am the dog with the little hat in the room on fire), to make sure I mention that I have it way better than a lot other people, that there’s a myriad of ways it could have been so much worse, that it’s just stuff after all.

Is it just stuff, though? I could feel it from the very beginning—this pressure to write off the decades of things I had painstakingly collected, vintage clothing and records and CDs and tapes and magazines and books (oh so many books, so many out of print books), as “just stuff” (you have your health! I silently screamed at myself, over and over) when what it actually felt like was losing my own shape, the contours of my selfhood, the physical manifestations of my unique humanness that all served to keep me feeling grounded and held and safe. It’s maybe silly to call back issues of The Face and NME “pieces of me” but that’s what they were, okay? Shouts to Ashlee Simpson. And nevermind the memory museum: the photos and journals and letters and ticket stubs from every concert I had attended since I was twelve years old, thirty-odd years of not being a minimalist (Marie Kondo was not welcome in my home).

You get more stuff, of course. The arc of time is long and bends towards more stuff. I’m so grateful to the people who gifted me t-shirts and records and more from their own personal collections (I cried every single time I opened a package), and to the brands whose PR teams somehow tracked down my PO box to deliver hand creams and make-up and hair products (an illustrious career as a “fire influencer” was really on the table there for a minute if I could have just tossed away every shred of my dignity—maybe next time). This stuff is new to me though. I haven’t assimilated. I am untethered and I have no real outline. In some ways I’m happier now? My heart is full of broken windows and there is a thin layer of ash over everything. I don’t want to wipe it away yet.