Memories like the corners of my mind

pandorapandora Posts: 21,855
Making, holding, feeling, learning from, caring, sharing memories is what life is all about.

I walk.
My low slung flared jeans make a swooshie sound on the ground as I walk. They are torn and frayed at the bottom from being too long. They cover my bare feet. My mother hates these jeans and my bare feet. I smile, it's the little things in life.
The sun moves in and out from under clouds as it warms my bare back,my back left exposed by my home made "hippie halter". A top I made the evening before from a colorful thin scarf tied just so and a piece of elastic around the neck.
My mother also hates this top. I smile again. A wicked teenage smile. The fact that I am bra less, a freedom I will enjoy most of my life, does not help matters. She hates that too.

As I write this for the life of me I can not remember his name. Someone so important I should remember.
I told him I would meet him in the park on the wooden trail bridge. The bridge over the stepping stones.

I walk
A song plays in my head
"I feel the earth move under my feet, I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down
I feel my heart start to tremblin when ever you're arooouuuunnd ".
I walk past the piano store, how ironic is that anyways? as my new favorite words whisper from my lips, "mother fucker how ironic is that? right here in my own neighborhood, mother fucker, go to hell" but I wonder
will it be me going to hell. I walk with my chin held high but the words, the feelings, leave a bitter taste in my mouth, mostly in my heart.

I pass Swan Pharmacy and glance at my church across the street. MY church? well up until eight years previous when my mother took the privilege of going to church away.
I was corrupted by candy. I was six. My sisters, with me in tow, skipped out using our church money at the pharmacy.
I look longer at the church.
Churches are so beautiful. They beckon you. There is a reason for this, I don't think it's pure.
I wonder what I have missed. I will always wonder what I missed.

I walk.
Cross the street past Lockers. It would be another seven years before I would find my work in a flower shop. Funny how you can go right past something for years and not know what is coming. We never know what is coming.
A horn sounds. I don't turn, I don't know them. It's the hair. The hair that to this day would attract attention. Silly stranger waves, horns, snickers, smiles, comments. I wonder where it came from. It is not my mothers hair. But it is mine, all mine. It is me.
Earlier that morning I laid my wild curls on the ironing board and pressed hard ironing out each to form the perfectly straight light blond hair that sways mid back as I walk. The Peggy Lipton hair. Oh how I wanted to look like her, be like her, be her. I can see the park now.

Someone so important I should remember his name.
My mother always said I will forget the names of people I don't like in life. I forget some names of people I do like and surely all those I don't.
My mother was right way too often. How annoying. I guess it goes with the job.

Long before he is even in sight I see his bushy blond hair, his big blue eyes. His tall frame and that shy but cocky way to confident smile. A confidence that comes from experience, too much experience for me.
It's not his fault how could he know? How could he know I would run, I would leave. That what hadn't even had a chance to start would never.
That the promise would be gone. Gone forever.

I walk
to meet him on the bridge.
He removes his small pocket knife and smiles, carves four initials into the old weathered wood. I can still see two P.S. I can not remember the other two. Something so important I should remember.

It's not his fault, how could he know?
That he might as well have slapped my face, that word stung so bad.
That word he said when I told him my secret. My life. Me. That word that changed everything.
To open and speak the shame that drowns me. To share the wound that I carried on my soul, the very essence of me.
To stand on that bridge, as time stopped and finally tell someone my secret. My life. Me.
And then that word.

And I run.
I run.
I run for so many years.

But now I walk again
I walk through the memories.
Each one precious.
Some a lesson, some a heartache, some a joy.
I walk and it's ok. It's all ok now.
I understand and it's ok.
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • PearlOfAGirlPearlOfAGirl Posts: 15,993
    I walk through the memories.
    Each one precious.
    Some a lesson, some a heartache, some a joy.
    I walk and it's ok. It's all ok now.
    I understand and it's ok.

    Sometimes we just need to know that it is ok.... :)

    Wish you were here...

    ~RIP Dad
  • the wolfthe wolf Posts: 7,027
    Pandora, I loved this. Really.

    thank you.


    Steve
    Peace, Love.


    "To question your government is not unpatriotic --
    to not question your government is unpatriotic."
    -- Sen. Chuck Hagel
  • mikalinamikalina Posts: 7,206
    Thank you for sharing your story with us. So very touching.
    ********************************************************************************************* image
  • chadwickchadwick Posts: 21,157
    i like this
    just lovely
    love the jeans and top.

    :)
    for poetry through the ceiling. ISBN: 1 4241 8840 7

    "Hear me, my chiefs!
    I am tired; my heart is
    sick and sad. From where
    the sun stands I will fight
    no more forever."

    Chief Joseph - Nez Perce
  • dimitrispearljamdimitrispearljam Posts: 139,720
    :clap::clap::clap::clap:
    u are something else,from another planet!!!in Avatar movie they must take the name of the planet from u..
    thats was all so beautiful.. :)
    "...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
    "..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
    “..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
  • pandorapandora Posts: 21,855
    Writing purges the soul and then there you are
    with your kind words
    to fill it back up with love and acceptance.
    I needed both.
    Thank you, All!
Sign In or Register to comment.