jeriendhal | Nothing Lasts Forever

In third or fourth grade, my arts teacher had us make little projects from cheap scrap leather, using punches, hammers, and various indentation tools. I made myself a keychain, using letter dies to carve my first initial and last name (plus some cutesy decorations) into disc of leather perhaps three inches wide. With an inch wide metal band set through a single hole, I had the keychain that I've been carrying for almost thirty years now. I like it because it's small enough to fit in my pocket, but large enough that I don't have much chance of losing the damned thing just by setting it down on a crowded desk.

It's been thuroughly distressed over the years, repeatedly dunked in water, bent, bent some more, until the leather became quite supple. But today I've noticed that the entire surface of the thing has become covered with minute cracks, and a casual scrape of my fingernail damages it when before almost nothing could seem to harm it.

If I have to replace it at the same time I need to get rid of the leather wallet my dad gave me after his last trip to SD, I'm going to be ticked.