I thought I saw that in the trash ...

Last night I was sitting around my apartment with my boyfriend, and I caught a glimpse of a brightly colored bag near a book shelf.

"Did you keep the bag I brought the saltwater taffy in?" I suspiciously asked my boyfriend. I had just returned from a wedding in Rehoboth Beach, Del., (yes, they have beaches in Delaware), and I brought back saltwater taffy for my boyfriend as a gift.

"Maybe," he said, still looking at the guitar he was re-stringing.

"Oh, OK," I said, but something still didn't feel right. "Wait, did you take that out of the trash."

Silence.

"Maybe."

Silence.

"I just want to remember our special moment," he said.

Special moment or not, my boyfriend has to be the ultimate pack-rat. If you have an extra TV, couch, radio, anything, even if it's broken, he'll take it. I think he even kept the paper I wrapped his Christmas present in.

I'm the total opposite. I don't keep old ticket stubs or dried out flowers. I enjoy our time together doing things, but I don't need pieces of our activity to remember that we did it. (I will confess, I do love pictures, though.) I think sometimes I've hurt my boyfriend's feelings by throwing away things, like a random rock we picked up at the river. Where am I going to keep that stuff anyway?

What is the attraction with keeping every single memento of a relationship? Do you keep everything or toss most of it? What if you break up? What do you do with the stuff you kept then?