What do we make of the possessions a loved one leaves?

I'm not sure how I ended up with my father's gold, V-neck, velour sweater from the 1970s, but my sentimental instincts resisted my wife's attempt to donate it to charity.

“It's ugly and you'll never wear it, she gently informed me.

“It was my Dad's, I softly explained.

Fortunately, Dad was still alive and could set me straight.

“It's ugly and I never wore it, Dad laughed. “Why do you think I gave it away?

I remember Dad's words as Mom and I sort through the closets and drawers of my brother Bill, who died Aug. 9 of bile duct cancer at age 48. Anyone who has even gone through a dead relative's possessions knows it's an emotional, bittersweet journey, especially for us sentimental types still raw with grief after the death of someone so young.

“When the family is dealing with this, it is very painful, says Christine Acosta, who, with her husband, Cesilo, own Key Estate Sales in St. Charles and have been through this process more than 630 times with families. “It's so much easier for us... because we don't have the emotional attachments. We feel for the clients. It's human nature to feel that with them. But we don't have that history.

Mom and I have 48 years of history with Bill. We don't have answers.

Did Bill store all these T-shirts in a box because they were so much a part of his life he wanted to save them, or did he dump them in the cardboard container so they'd be ready to donate to Goodwill?

I start to think, maybe even hope, that there is a special reason Bill kept this old birthday card from a former girlfriend. But the card sits in a box with unopened American Express bills from 2004, which clearly weren't important to my brother in 2004, let alone now. Did this key chain from New Orleans have an emotional meaning for Bill, or was it just a trinket he threw in a drawer and forgot all about?

Did Bill (as those old American Express bills might suggest) actually buy a half-dozen nearly identical weatherproof jackets because he kept misplacing them, or were they perks he stockpiled from his job working with TV crews at sporting events? Some decisions are easy. There's no question we'll keep his souvenirs from Super Bowls, the Indy 500, the Masters and such, even if they remain in closets and boxes.

Finding three extra chargers for his Blackberry reminds me of the time I called him in a panic because he accidentally left for a road trip with my cell phone charger. He told me to go to any nice hotel and look through the lost-and-found box until I found one that fit my phone. I bought a replacement.

My brother, a talented musician, saved hundreds of business cards and scraps of papers with phone numbers and e-mail addresses. We throw them away, but we keep his handwritten song lists and chord progressions for one of his keyboard performances.

We are confounded by our discovery of two pairs of girl's blue jeans with the tags still on. Were they never-delivered presents for a niece? Gifts for a friend's daughter? An outfit for some ridiculously skinny young thing he was dating? Do we donate everything to charity, distribute it to loved ones, or leave it in boxes for Bill's nieces and nephews to ponder after we're gone.

“I've met with clients who have been going through a house for a year before they call us, Acosta says. Some mistakenly think everything is valuable and are crushed when “we try to, as gently as possible, explain that “old or “collectible doesn't necessarily mean “it's worth money.

“Then there are the clients who think it's all junk and they want to get rid of it, Acosta says, telling about how “we've actually pulled some $300 and $400 toys out of the Dumpster in front of the house.

As the mother of four daughters, age 5 to 22, Acosta says she's already “written notes and tucked them into things for my future estate liquidator.

The items left by my brother, who never married or owned a home and spent a lot of time on the road, are valuable only in the way they have Mom and me laughing and getting teary-eyed as we recall priceless memories of Bill.

“Would this fit you? Mom asks as she comes across a stash of Bill's shirts.

I can wear Bill's favorite shirts, but should I? I was the yin to Bill's yang, the brake to his throttle, the anchor to his sail, the plan for tomorrow to his live for today. Would Bill want me to loosen up a bit by wearing his expensive silk summer shirts with the bold patterns, or would I just look silly? Bill could wear those Abercrombie & Fitch blue jeans with the holes. I suggest we pass those along to a nephew. But I keep Bill's blue-collar work shirts promoting Buell motorcycles, Sun Studio or Johnny Cash. Unlike Dad's old velour sweater, these items have style and look good.

If my wife doesn't think I can pull off the look, at least we can take heart in how the spectacle of me trying to look like Bill would have made Bill erupt into one of his great belly laughs.