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Bex Hall > the 100 day project 2022

the 100 day project 2022

The plastic daisy keychain

February 17, 2022

She was a marketing genius

This is the 3rd story in the Objects as Waypoints Writing Project series.

Coal River Road, St. Albans, WV

When the box arrived on our doorstep, Grandmother called her best friend, Ora, who showed up soon after. In the kitchen, they opened it to see what they had painstakingly chosen and ordered from a novelty catalog weeks earlier.

One thousand daisy-shaped plastic key chains in a variety of neon colors, glowing with possibility.

Imprinted in the center of each ring was her signature tagline, “Cakes For All Occasions DOROTHY A. BRYAN” in metallic gold on a black background. Grandmother was a 1970s marketing genius.

I stole an orange one and stashed it in the wooden box under my bed.


Before Dorothy was a Bryan, she was a Davis and in the 1940s she honed her cake-decorating skills at several bakeries before striking out on her own with D. Bryan’s Sweet Shop in the 1950s.

When she outgrew the home-based bakery, she and Ora opened the Kountry Kitchen on Walnut Street in town. Because of her cake artistry, the governor’s office chose her to bake a 250-pound cake for the celebration of West Virginia’s Centennial in 1963.

Some years later, she closed the shop and went to nursing school.

Right before graduation, she had emergency gallbladder surgery. During recovery, Granddad promised her a new car if she would forget about being a nurse.

Mom tells me today Grandmother once told her she grew to hate that car.


By the 1970s, Grandmother was back in business, based in her home kitchen. When I asked her why she decorated cakes, she said, “Two reasons. One, I love who I am when I make something beautiful, and two, I make my own ‘pin money.’”

I had to look it up. It’s money given to a wife from her husband as an allowance. This was my first lesson in irony. Or was it sarcasm? Maybe a little of both.

She used that money to buy those key chains, much to Granddad’s chagrin.


Grandmother was in her fifties when she described the creative flow and how she felt about herself when she was in it. It took until I was in my fifties before my heart heard what she meant.

The wooden box from my childhood is long gone. Its contents disappeared into tubs filled with a lifetime of keepsakes. As I riffle through yellowed newspaper clippings and sepia-toned photos, I find it. An orange plastic daisy.

It has lost its luster, the black center scratched. The chain is missing.

Now, I keep it with me in a car I love. It’s as if Grandmother is riding right beside me.

It’s as if she’s beside me.

Dorothy’s Cakes For All Occasions

Filed Under: Memoir in Objects Tagged With: the 100 day project 2022, the objects

The Marine Corps ring

February 16, 2022

USMC ring

Camp Lejeune

34° 43’ 29.4996”N, 77° 20’ 39.4764”W

Mom joined the marines on her 18th birthday, finished boot camp at Parris Island, and stationed at Camp Lejeune, where she met Dad.

It was around this time, 59 years ago, a Saturday night in mid-February when Dad told Mom he was Catholic and he knew a certain method. She, being in love or in lust, (or maybe both), trusted him.

They married on March 25, 1963 in our hometown of St. Albans, WV, at the First Presbyterian Church, founded in 1868. The bride wore white. I was technically present at the ceremony, but I remember little.


Dad was overseas when I was born and the story goes Dad was on the phone and Grandmother pinched me so I’d make a noise for him to hear. As years passed, Dad insisted Louis Armstrong’s “It’s a Wonderful World” was playing when he first heard my voice. Dad swore I made his world wonderful just by being in it.

But he didn’t stick around to prove the claim. He was gone by the time Satchmo released the song in 1968.


Grandmother passed away 16 years ago and among her things, I found Mom’s USMC ring, a yellowed newspaper clip about the day she joined, and her service coat. I tried it on and it’s two sizes too small but the ring fit. I keep the clipping and ring in my jewelry box, her coat in the spare closet.

Mom says she has no use for these things. I really don’t either. But I keep them anyway.


Ring and service coat
18th birthday she’s a marine

Filed Under: Memoir in Objects Tagged With: the 100 day project 2022, the objects

Gifts from strangers on Valentine’s Day

February 14, 2022

Out of the three, only the scarf remains

The scarf I keep

Cleveland Clinic

41° 30’ 8.928”N, 81° 37’ 16.6512”W


My husband left me on Valentine’s Day in 2014.

It’s not what you think. Yes, he left me, but it was because he had to drive five hours home to tend to an emergency. Which left me at the Cleveland Clinic, alone, for a third day of tests and more overnights.

He was by my side through two blood transfusions, a liver biopsy, and many tests. And now I was without my advocate, my cheerleader.


The sun shines through the window in my 5th floor room, but there’s no warmth, only long shadows.

Hordes of doctors and residents gather around my bed. Their voices a quiet murmur, but words like Pre-leukemia and Wilson’s Disease get my attention. My heart monitor beeps faster. 

I search their faces, their expressions. I want to know what they see, what they think of my extreme yellowness, and what they will do to fix my broken body.

They exit en masse and leave behind a vacuum of silence. Dust motes dance in the cold sunbeams.


A knock at the door announces a visitor. It’s the staff chaplain come to see if there’s anything I need.

Let’s see, what do I need? I need answers; I need not to be sick; I need a miracle; I need to go home.

Inside my head.

Out loud, “I’m fine, thanks.”

He takes my hand and says a prayer. My fear melts into hot tears. I cannot hold them in.

He returns a few hours later with a gift. A tin of ginger peach tea. I make a cup, sit by my window, and watch the cars below rush around like ants, so busy. Living their lives.


Another knock, another stranger. A lady volunteer ambles in with a smile and a turquoise vase topped with a red tipped carnation. She places it on my windowsill right next to the tin of tea and says, “This is for you for Valentine’s Day. I hope you feel better soon.”

A second gift from a second stranger. Magic.

Maybe I’ll take a walk in the corridor.


There is an area at the end of my hallway for visitors. I notice a woman crocheting a curly scarf. She tells me her adult son is here for a liver transplant, but it wasn’t a match. They’ve admitted him and are not sure when he can go home.

She’s making scarves to raise money for their medical bills. They’re $10 each. I give her a $20, wishing I had a $50, and tell her to keep the change and the scarf. But she insists I take the scarf, so I do.

I return to my room and wrap it around the flower vase and the tea tin in my windowsill. It’s like a mini-shrine of sorts. An altar to kindness and love.

I get back in bed and stare at the objects sitting in the late afternoon sunlight. The shadows have grown longer, it’s getting late. Time is running out for the day, and for me. And that man. For so many.


In the eight years since that day, the vase and tin disappeared. The scarf I keep. 

When I wear it, I think about the miracle of second chances. I think about the strength of love; a mother who does whatever it takes to help her dying son.

And I’m reminded that even on our darkest and loneliest days, the power of kindness, both received and given, can lift and heal broken spirits.

Filed Under: Memoir in Objects Tagged With: the 100 day project 2022, the objects

New 100 day project defined

February 13, 2022

Writing about objects as waypoints on a roadmap

Photo credit Dariusz Sankowski
Photo credit: Dariusz Sankowski

Why do we keep the objects we keep? 

We form emotional attachments to seemingly ordinary objects for various reasons. Maybe an object bore witness to a significant moment or event, or was a gift from a loved one, or perhaps it represents an important influence that shaped your life.

The treasures and trinkets on our walls and shelves, stashed in drawers, scrapbooks, and jewelry boxes, hold the stories that define who we are.

It is only in the world of objects that we have time and space and selves.”

— T.S. Eliot

I liken these objects we keep to waypoints on the roadmap of our lives. These waypoints mark the moments, from the mundane to the extraordinary, we experienced as we navigated the route of our life’s journey. 

From this, I’ve created the Objects as Waypoints Writing Project. For 100 days, I will write 50 short stories about the objects I’ve kept that represent the waypoints on my roadmap. 

This framework motivates me to examine the intersection of memory, emotion, and facts. I believe in writing these stories I will find answers to questions I don’t yet know how to ask. In the curation of objects alone, I’ve already found new understanding, patterns, and themes in my life I was unaware, because I never dug deep.

And now it’s time. 

Every few days, I’ll draft a story and share it with a photo.

That’s the plan.

I hope you’ll come along on my “road trip” and if you do, bring snacks and your favorite playlist.

Until next time, XOXO

#the100dayproject

Filed Under: Memoir Background Tagged With: behind the book, objects as waypoints, the 100 day project 2022

History of photo sparks new project

January 28, 2022

A memoir-in-objects is on the drawing board

Grandpa’s photo circa 1940s?

In 1989, my dad came to visit and brought with him a 9×12 manila envelope full of photos from his father’s estate. I chose only one to keep. The one Grandpa snapped while he was in France, Dad explained.

It’s of an artist painting en plein air. Her canvas appears complete, but is she finished? Is that grandpa’s coat, because it looks masculine. Was she a lover or a stranger? Why this moment and what was Grandpa’s motivation?

Mystery unsolved, I tucked the photo away where it remained for 33 years. It slipped out of its stack the other day and, once again, the unanswered questions surfaced. 

I’ll never know the story behind this photo. But what if Grandpa had left behind a written account? What if he had written short stories about the things he kept? The objects that were important to him, for whatever reason.

This is the spark that ignited the idea for my 100 day project. 

Online, I discovered the Portland Art Museum has hosted Object Stories since 2010, a personal storytelling project and exhibition. I found and read “The Secret Life of Objects” by Dawn Raffel and other similar books.

The stories are poignant and honest. Objects we keep may seem ordinary to others, but can have deep and meaningful connections. This fascinates and resonates to my core. I hear a whisper and feel a nudge to pursue this.

I recently wrote “If only [what hangs on] these walls could talk” which describes the history behind some objects I cherish. I really enjoyed the process. Looking back to older pieces, I found many instances of memory writing where my voice was authentic.

I’ve wanted to write a memoir since 2014. I’ve taken classes and workshops, and written over 20K words and it’s gone nowhere. But this—this format, makes sense. The flip side of this coin contains a bonus: for the day I suspect my daughters may have questions, here will be some answers.

So far, I’ve gathered about 60 objects. I’ve filled out index cards for each, with brief descriptions of the memories, events, and people connected. It’s not all sorted yet, but that’s part of the fun, the plans and prep work. The project launches on February 13th and between now and then, I’ll keep at it and share what I learn as I go.

Until next time, xox.

The objects assembled

Our lives are the sum of our memories.”

—Joshua Foer

Filed Under: Memoir Background Tagged With: behind the book, the 100 day project 2022

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About Bex

 

Bex Hall

Her writing has appeared in various online and print publications, most recently in Kerning, a literary magazine, and in the Stories of Hope Collection in Transplant Living. Her artwork has appeared and sold through the Grayson Gallery. She blogs here about creative life and creates in Studio BE overlooking the Ohio River. Her work in progress is a memoir about the secret life of objects.

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  • The 100 Day Project

    50 short stories in 100 days.

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  • Creative practice goals:

    Show up every day behind the pen, the brush, or the lens and share my work.

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