When my grandfather passed away in 2012, my "big" item from the estate was a 1938 Frigidaire that sat in the basement of my grandparents' home in the suburbs of Chicago.
It was always kind of mysterious down there - and one of those things you're told not to play with as a child...as tempting as it was having to walk past it to get to the shelves of board games.
I remember it being used mostly for special occasions, like homemade Polish sausage at Easter (because the garlic was so strong it would stink up the other fridge...and all of St. George's when they would bring it to be blessed...things you don't see in California).
It had a matching deep freezer...that was massive, too massive to make the trek back to SoCal with, but equally cool.
In my grandfather's later years, long after my grandmother passed away, he used it to store his socks (turned off, of course), as it was conveniently located in the laundry room and nearby "his" bathroom in the basement.
According to family lore, both the fridge and freezer belonged to my great-grandparents and were moved there after they passed.
Accompanied by rolling eyes and a lot of doubt about it every being used, it was crated with other estate items and shipped West.
I don't really remember how it made it from the crate to my garage, but there it sat for seven years, awaiting its destiny.
I was ready to have it restored a few years ago, but decided to wait because it weighed a ton and I only want to move it in once. I had a hard time finding someone to do the restoration work - turns out most people have zero interest in dealing with an 80-year-old beast of a fridge.
I finally found someone and the kitchen reno finally got finished and it moved into its new home. And I awaited the massive electric bill everyone said it would cause.
And guess what. It never showed up. That "meter-miser" feature still does the trick. My electric bill is actually $5 less a month! Go figure!
So while I may have to defrost it every few weeks and have to mind the size of containers I purchase, this fridge sparks joy in me. And I would not have it any other way...except for maybe storing socks.