I wonder why we are so darned sentimental.

The things I treasure most are the objects collecting the most dust, but collectively they hold my dearest memories, too.

Every time I walk by my giant stuffed Blue Bunny, I smile inside, sometimes even outside, remembering how he came into my life.

Mama was in the hospital with the flu, and Daddy exhausted himself trying to turn his little boy’s frown upside down. We ate at the fancy cafe in town, both of us racing to the bottom of root beer floats, and I led him into the dollar store, starring up at a giant stuffed Blue Bunny.

With tears in my eyes and a few sassy kicks of my boots on the floor, I insisted that Mama was going to bring it home for Easter before she got sick — a sob story that was at least in the vicinity of true. I was about 75 percent finished convincing her.

Daddy had a soft heart. I was only five, and Blue Bunny was taller than me. I dragged it down the hallways of the Perry County Hospital, past the nurse’s station, and through the door to Mama’s room. She shook her head from side to side, declaring my entreaty to Daddy a slight misrepresentation of what she recalled. I have never focused much on small details. Of course, Mama, Blue Bunny, and I got along just fine. Blue Bunny even has a fancy set of handmade clothes these days, courtesy of my second mama.

I never run out of memories, and I hope all of you cherish sentimental reminders of the best small moments of your own lives. I have the antique Porky the Pig piggy bank Daddy bought me from somewhere he traveled in his 18-wheeler and my Eskimo doll he mailed home to me from the snowy slopes of Alaska. Dorothy still dances with the Tin Man when I wind the music box Mama won for me at an auction one Saturday night years ago, and my house will soon be filled with a variety of stuffed bunnies for Easter, the ones she collected and adored.

We hold onto these tokens with every fiber of our being, as if we are pressing pause on time gone by so it will stand still in our hearts. Mama’s delicate porcelain dolls sit on chairs in most all of my rooms, whether it’s the Victorian doll sitting in the corner of an antique settee upstairs or the twins clothed in frilly lace posed together on a duvet. I keep them close, and you may call me sentimental if you please.

I take it as a compliment.

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David Creel, a Vicksburg resident, is a syndicated columnist. You may reach him at beautifulwithdavid@gmail.com.