It’s only a coat hanger. But it brings back such fond memories

Aug 28, 2023

A lifetime ago, in postwar Zagreb, my grandmother wrote her name on a wooden coat hanger. It means as much as any gravestone

We spend an awful lot of time and money memorialising our loved ones. There is the gravestone, obviously, and then perhaps plaques on trees or park benches or seats in football grounds, plus other stuff such as pendants made from ashes and so on. But for me it’s always going to be the small stuff that matters.

I lost a dear friend six years ago. I treasure his sturdy flip-flops, although they ravage my feet summer in, summer out. I treasure his stripy dressing gown, but it’s getting threadbare, so I’ve had to semi-retire it. I treasured his garish suitcase until its rubber bottom perished and ruined a carpet. It had to go. Sorry, Guy.

But it’s even more random stuff that thumps me gently in my solar plexus. For example, the recipe for my nan’s tooth-breaking toffee. It’s written out on a small sheet of Basildon Bond in her elegant, looping hand. I’ve given up trying to make it; I cock it up every time. But when I’m riffling through the chaos of my recipe file, it stops me dead still for a moment, a happy moment, every time.

It’s the same with my Croatian grandmother. Living in a small flat with my mum and her sister in postwar Zagreb, there were squabbles over the limited number of wooden coat hangers they had. So they wrote their names on them. The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia had its faults, but, by God, they built coat hangers to last. The other day, I came across one in my wardrobe with her name on it: Katarina Bašić. Again, I was blessed with a quick, soothing moment. Occasionally, I get to visit her grave, in Zagreb, which is nice, but I can’t swear that the experience is any more profound than my moment with the coat hanger. I’ll be sure to write my name on one before my time comes.

Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist