some things are harder to throw away than you think

I don't even remember the exact day i got these roses
I just remember thinking that I should keep them for a while.
At first , they looked completely normal. Fresh, bright and honestly tooo prettyy to throw away after a few days. I thought maybe I would put them somewhere, take a picture, , and then eventually get rid of them when they started drying out
But I didn't.
Somehow, a few days became a few weeks , and then i just got used to seeing them there. They slowly changed. The petals weren't as soft anymore, the colour wasn't the same , and the leaves started looking dry. If someone else saw them , they might just see a bunch of old roses that should have been thrown away a long time ago.
But for some reason, i still couldn't do it.
I think we do this with a lot of things without even realising it. We keep old tickets, screenshots, notes, little gifts, random pieces of paper or things that really have any use anymore. And if someone asks why we're keeping them , sometimes we don't even have a proper answer.
It's not always because the thing itself is important. Sometimes it's because of the moment attached to it.
Lookingg at these roses now is a little strange. They're not perfect anymore. Actually, they're nowhere close to how they looked in the beginning. But maybe that's exactly why i like them now. They remind me that something doesn't have to stay exactly the same to still mean something.
I also think there's something comforting about keeping a small reminder of a good moment. Not because you want to live in the past, but because life moves so quickly that sometimes it's nice to have something physical that makes you stop for a second and remember.
These roses were probably supposed to last only a few days. Instead, i kept them much longer than i expected.
And honestly, i don't know when I'll finally throw them away. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe next month. Maybe when they become so dry that there's nothing left to save
But for now , I'll keep them
Not because they're still beautiful in the way they once were
Just because I remember why I wanted to keep them in the first place.
Do you also have something completely ordinary that you've kept for way longer than you probably should have?