We had some hope for awhile that his estate would help us out of the hole we were in, but that didn’t pan out.

My grandfather hadn’t paid his taxes on the ranch for years.

When he died, the county wanted full payment, with interest, immediately.

We sold the ranch at auction.

After the backtaxes and the funeral expenses were paid, there was nothing.

Well, almost nothing.

All that was left was my grandfather’s old clothes, the household furniture, his wedding ring and the old steamer truck with no key.

I didn’t want to break the lock and there wasn’t enough money to pay a locksmith, so the trunk just sat there.

We kept some of the furniture and gave the rest of the furniture and the old clothes to charity.

I put my grandfather’s wedding ring in my jewelry box for sentimental reasons, it wasn’t worth selling.

 

My husband became morose, all he could think about was the mistakes he had made in his life.

He seemed to think that if he could start over, he would have done better.

I tried to tell him that I loved him and that it didn’t matter to me that we weren’t rich, but he wouldn’t listen.

He would sit for hours going over everything he had done in his life.

He kept talking about the mistakes he had made.

Sometimes I thought he secretly believed our marriage was one of his mistakes.

His authoritarianism became unbearable; he treated me like a little girl.

Once in a while, he would blow up over the smallest things, then brood and pout for days afterward.

It was like living with a superannuated five-year old.

I would have divorced him if there had been enough money.

 

Strangely, though, I still loved him.

I guess not being able to have a baby had hit me pretty hard.

I knew our poverty wasn’t his fault.

I wanted to hold him and tell him it was okay, that everything would be alright.

I still wanted to take care of him.

I tried to think of everything I could to raise some money.

After a while, I got to thinking about the steamer.

I thought maybe there might be something valuable inside.

If I found something, he might feel better.

I went to the library and got a book on locksmithing.

I read that the trunk has what’s called awarded post-type lock and can be easily picked.

I went to the hobby shop and bought some music wire and cut a small piece, then bent the end into a key shape.

I waited until my husband was taking a nap (I wanted it to be a surprise) and tried to open the lock.

It took me about an hour to pick the lock.

 

When I opened the trunk it was filled with my great-grandfather’s journals and a collection of loose bronze artifacts.

I decided the artifacts might be valuable to a collector so I decided to clean them up.

I knew better than to use metal cleaner or chemicals on them, but I figured that plain old water and a soft cloth was safe.