There is a pivotal scene at the end of Orson Welles’ cinematic masterpiece, Citizen Kane.

This rich and powerful man has destroyed many people’s lives in pursuing his ruthless ambitions. Now he is on his deathbed.

The only word Citizen Kane utters is, “Rosebud.” SPOILER ALERT: Rosebud is the name of his snow sled. In the scene that follows, we see workmen tossing it into a blast furnace along with a lot of other seemingly useless stuff.

Here we see that on the brink of his impending death, the protagonist Citizen Kane goes back in his mind to the freedom and joy he once had and enjoyed in the simpler time of his childhood.

I, too, had items of deep sentimental value that were my constant companions when I was a child. I clung to them then as children seeking security often do. Much like Linus and his famous blue blanket, my “pinkie blanket” was my constant companion when I was a toddler.

This cuddly soft blanket was a 100% wool Kenworth in a light shade of pink. It had been given as a Christmas present from my paternal grandmother in the year I was born.

There was a darker backstory behind that gift. For reasons known only to her, my grandmother refused to see me when I was taken to visit her shortly after my birth. Who knows why? She was pretty crazy best of times.

My father – the youngest of three boys who came late to fatherhood – was devastated by her rejection. And as terrible sadness often presents in hurt people, Dad was deeply angry.

When a gift box arrived a few days before Christmas, it was all my mother could do to keep Dad from taking it to his mother’s house and throwing it on her front porch.

But he was talked out of it and didn’t. It turned out to be a lucky call. My grandmother dropped dead of a heart attack a few days later on December 23rd in the same year I was born.

Had that gift been angrily rejected and returned, my mother worried Dad would have taken on all of the guilt for causing his mother’s death. As it was, he seemed guilty enough for just breathing the same air as she did.

It is more than a bit ironic, then, that the pinkie blanket became my constant companion and primary source of comfort as I grew a little older. I now wonder how Dad must have felt seeing me drag it around all the time after the drama surrounding its origins.

I had a white toy dog, too, who was very important to me, too. He was most reminiscent of some breed of schnauzer or terrier. He walked forward shakily on his four stiff legs when you pressed a button in his neck. Though the name on the sales tag said, “Knee High,” I called him “Highknee.”

The perceptive and Yiddish speakers among you will note his name is pronounced and so might easily have been spelled “h-e-i-n-i-e.” Which could have been pretty accurate as that is about how tall he was in relation to my backside back then.

After years of upheaval, both Highknee and my pinkie blanket were lost in the mists of many, many moves. Yet, the comfort and companionship and pleasure they afforded me when I most needed them still lingers in the recesses of my childhood memories.

Come to think of it, I have cycled through various artifacts and icons of comfort over time. They varied. I toted around a huge pink elephant with neon bright psychedelic patterned ears a teenage boyfriend gave me until it fell apart.

The same boyfriend gave me a blue and cherry pink reversible satin comforter. It also eventually succumbed to the vagaries of age and a cannibalistic washing machine.

These days, I take comfort from a variety of beautiful things. A sitting Buddha statue sits serenely in my bespoke mango Asian room.

Articles of my children’s clothing from when they were infants and toddlers are socked away in dresser drawers and fawned over occasionally. To be taken out and used again, perhaps, when my children have little ones of their own. If wishes were horses ….

I have a multitude of candles I keep stored away. When I want to bring light and spirit into a room, I bring them out and light them.

Certain artworks I’ve collected evokes special memories. The art has not always come from a place I’ve been to except in my mind’s eye. Still those pieces comfort me by emotional and geographic association.

I treasure a few other special artifacts for the positive memories they bring up, too. But I know I don’t need them. They are luxuries.

I have lived long periods of my life keeping no reminders of my past lives on display around me. The artifacts of my material life was often put in storage, for example, if I was moving around the country for a contract or some other work engagement.

Most of these desirable “things” are “wants” in my life, not “needs.” As if on cue, some material item often comes up or comes back to me when I most need comfort. Not necessarily the same item or in the same form as the original.

But close enough in shape or form to evoke the memories of comfort I needed when I was younger and more vulnerable. Those memories often rise again to comfort me in adulthood.

I have white Kenmore wool blankets now. Highknee has been replaced by a tortoiseshell cat named Nalita.

I am as grateful for the memories of comfort I had in childhood as I was for the items themselves. I am more than grateful for the living breathing things that give me comfort now.

My husband. My friends. My daughter. My cat. My house plants.

If we are lucky, we eventually learn that things – no matter how luxurious or expensive or rare or treasured – are, after all, just things. If we are very lucky, we learn to comfort ourselves in the midst of having nothing material at all.