Memories

Some days I live surrounded by the past, especially today when so much I have done has been connected to a memory. While putting in my contacts this morning I was suddenly transported back to being 11 years old standing in my bathroom with orange carpet and orange wallpaper and my Dad standing over me trying to be as gentle as possible while putting in my first contact lenses for me. He would try his best to put those contacts in his daughter’s eyes each morning knowing how resistant she was through the tears and foot stomping refusals. That was the summer before 6^th grade which was literally a painful one as I had to learn to wear gas permeable contact lenses for longer and longer periods of time in preparation for being able to wear them full time when school began. They were a painful solution to my rapidly declining eyesight or as my doctor so eloquently put it, “They would keep me from wearing coke bottle bottom glasses” Great way to build up an adolescent girl’s already crumbling self-esteem. To say that they were awful was an understatement. Torture would be a more fitting description. I remember counting down the minutes that summer until I could take them out and feel relief each day.  

As I watered my tomato planters I am reminded of my Grandparents and the only week I spent alone with them just my sister and me. The big events of the week were going to Sears, eating at Morrison’s, watching tons of Wimbledon on TV, and eating the best garden fresh tomatoes sliced up on a plate as a side to every supper served that week. I also remember playing with their dog Gerky. I think by that time my Granddaddy had finally given up teaching me how to solve the Rubik’s cube. It was a relief for us both.

I recently received a wonderful present from my cousins that is still sitting out in my kitchen. I haven’t the heart to put them up in my kitchen cabinet just yet. Every year we traveled to their home in Alabama for Thanksgiving and every year I remember seeing my aunt’s pilgrim salt and pepper shakers. She passed away a few years ago and out of the blue recently I received them in the mail. They are a perfect reminder of her as she will forever be linked to Thanksgiving in my mind. They remind me of home, family, good conversation, and of course incredible food. Special times. It makes me wonder how future extended family celebrations will be remembered by my girls as things now are so fragmented by distance and other time restraints. It seems so much harder to get everyone together in one place at one time anymore. Sadly, practically a miracle.

Leaving the mailbox today I see my oldest running down the long, hilly driveway toward our home and I am reminded of why we came to live in this house five years ago and why we decided to make a lifestyle change to move out of a large city with all of its conveniences to a more small town life. Riley runs with such freedom and joy, wild abandon really without a trace of fear at all. I want that fearlessness to remain with her always. Six years ago when we began to build this house I had visions of children running down this very driveway and I wondered who they would be and what they would look like. So magical to have a dream appear in flesh and blood before you. And all that comes to mind is the feeling of thankfulness as the past and present come together to collide in this one perfect moment. The explosion creating right now.