My grandmother was firm. “They’re for you. We always wanted you to have them”

Several months after our wedding, my grandparents gifted us with a set of vintage china. We didn’t have room in our small apartment for a spare set of dishes, so Grandpa said he’d store them a little while longer, until we bought a house.

A few years later, we moved and finally had more space, but because I’m a minimalist — or like to think of myself as one — I politely tried to defer again.

My grandmother was firm. “They’re for you. We always wanted you to have them.”

That settled it. We loaded the quilted cases of dishes into our van and took them across the George Washington Bridge with us.

On a visit, Grandpa told us the story of the dishes as he drank black coffee. He recounted how as a newly married man, he worked as a salesman for a company called Easy Glitter. The company ran a contest: The employee who sold the most car wax would receive a set of bone-china dishes. Grandpa won, and the dishes were packed away, cherished for 60 years, because they were too special to use. My grandparents moved from Brighton Beach to North Woodmere to Hewlett, taking these dishes with them.

I wondered at the dishes’ significance and by what merit they were held on to for so long. I tried to ask more, but the story, like their lives, was vast, and covered too many years and locations. The explanations were vague.

“They’re very valuable,” my grandmother whispered. “Maybe give the kids paper plates.”