I keep telling everyone who walks into my space that I AM NOT a hoarder. I’m a collector. There’s a big difference.

I collect notes. I save almost every note I’ve written, typed or scribbled in the past 20 years, thinking something in those notes may be useful someday. I collect lighthouses and music boxes.

But mostly, I collect cups. I like mugs better because they make for a bigger drink. I’ve been collecting them for more than 35 years. Actually, I have one that dates back to the 1970s when McDonald’s offered its first promotion for a morning cup of coffee. The mug is the one that has a sunshine face on the side and is yellow and white.

I began collecting them because they were inexpensive souvenirs to take home from a trip. If you received one of those mugs, you were special. Some were “gifts” when I signed in for a mental health writers conference or Georgetown University Training Conference. Most come with a story.

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My cousin and friend, Brenda, will remember the story of the lighthouse mug that I purchased at a mental health and respite training conference in Providence, Rhode Island. We had a nice little hotel room overlooking the interstate — I know you thought I was going to say the shore. During the night, our bathroom light burned out and it was hard to find the way to the bathroom and the seat in the dark.

So I called in a report a little after midnight and was told they couldn’t send anyone to change it until maintenance came on in the morning. That would be sometime after 7. I asked them to send me a spare bulb and a flashlight so I could see to change it myself, but that wasn’t allowed. (I put a little Post-it reminder to self: pack a spare light bulb or at least a large flashlight in the future.)

By 10 a.m. there still had been no one to change the bulb. Our workshops started at 8 a.m., and I took my first break at 10 to go back to the room.

I was in the bathroom when I heard a knock at the door, and I yelled, “Just a minute.” Then I heard a key in the door.

“Just a minute,” I shouted.

But as I said it, the intruder knocked on the door. As I shouted again more loudly, the door opened and a young man walked in carrying a light bulb and a ladder. I screamed, but he said nothing.

He turned and ran out the door, and near as I could tell he was running down the hall.

I felt very bad for him later when I learned he was the maintenance man who came on duty at 7. He also was hearing impaired and couldn’t hear me when I called out to him.

The other gals at the conference laughed with me over the story, and we went on throughout the day. (I also came home from that conference with a small stash of little flashlights donated by other attendees.)

Recently I “had breakfast” with my friend, Nancy. Several years ago she gave me a lime green Fiesta mug. It was given to her by the owner and operator of the Fiesta plant in Pennsylvania. She was an ardent collector of Fiestaware and began talking to the old gentleman outside the plant. She said she really thought he was an employee because he definitely was dressed for work. As she told him about her finds over the years, he asked if she and her husband, Ed, would like to tour with him. He took them to some of the more secluded rooms where single pieces were stashed here and there. Before they left, he had loaded them down with quite a haul of gifts.

It was awesome to hear about the adventure when she presented me with my mug.

I’ve got a couple of mugs from an old steamboat run down the Mississippi and one from the 75th anniversary of Woman’s Press Club of Indiana, another from Children’s Workshop in Columbus, Indiana, and many more.

My newest and sure to be among my favorites for years to come came from Dinah Oldham just before Christmas. Eight of us who graduated in 1967 from Pendleton High School have been getting together for breakfast over the years, and Dinah dubbed us the “Golden Girls.”

She had mugs made for each of us, which said Golden Girls around the top rim; and around the mug itself were caricatures of each of us with our corresponding names — Diana (Ford Jones), Diana (Hawhee), Debbie (Sisson Kelly), Dinah, myself, Beth (Hoppes), Jane (Anderson Lloyd),and Linda (Noble West).

Now I am going to drink another cup of memories — and perhaps I should write them down while I can still remember.