Sorting through baby teeth and Marmite jars, I realised I

I had always called myself ‘a collector’. Then I saw that holding on to things had become my way of coping with hard times

Was it the crate of saved wrapping paper, carefully archived by colour? Or the sheath of car tax discs, dating back to my first vehicle (owned 16 years ago), stored in a monogrammed wallet that did not bear my initials? No, it was the sweet little pillbox, shiny in its innocence, that revealed the greatest horror: every tooth I have ever lost. Further grotesque inspection determined that, alongside fragmented baby fangs were wisdom teeth – suggesting that the filing system had been upheld for quite some years. If I’d kept them this long, perhaps I should still hang on to them, I reasoned. As always, an attempt to chuck things out had been thwarted.

I have always collected. It started with pencils, soaps and china animals, progressing to more mainstream hobbyist items: stamps, coins and gem stones. My childhood fossil collection expanded into acquiring rocks and stones more generally, until my bedroom was full of museum-like pockets, each group neatly curated. As a Brownie, my collector’s badge was awarded for my collection of collections, the assessor agog at the sheer number of cigarette cards, beads and Fimo models on display. I loved books and sheet music, too, and it was broadly accepted that this need to keep and arrange things – often in ways that made no sense to others – was part and parcel of a curious mind.

Claire Jackson is a journalist who writes about classical music, art and animals