The Tyranny of the Heirloom

(NYTimes) - MELODIE BRYANT, a New York City composer, never wanted the portrait of her Uncle Ivins.
There were many things she did want, when her mother moved from an elegant 2,500-square-foot apartment in Los Angeles to a far smaller place in Manhattan, but plenty of others that she didn’t, though she ended up with them anyway: the mirrored Victorian vanity with tiny drawers that replaced a sturdy bureau with room for her socks, underwear and sweaters; the little armchair, mild as a timid 19th-century housemaid in a faded dress, that had survived the San Francisco earthquake but was too small to serve as a comfortable reading chair. Continued

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