Time Pieces

I was so small that I could hide under the end table in the living room, next to the couch. I’d lay under the table and watch feet go by. My mom would play Marty Robbins’ Greatest Hits on our long stereo/TV unit. I was very impressed by this media device. It took up an entire wall and served as a table to put food on when guests were over. I stared at the speakers on the thing, with the green carpet soft beneath me. The green curtains flowing in the breeze. I could smell Windex in the air mixed with the smell of spaghetti sauce or some other thing going in the kitchen. It seemed that my mom was always cooking or cleaning. Washing clothes. Doing something in the yard. I’d sit under that table and watch the feet and listen to the voices. Hearing what happened in the house without me in the mix. Amazed sometimes at how long it took someone to ask where I was. I remember the light, the cast of it. There are many different kinds of light. Morning light, afternoon, evening. The light of bulbs in dark rooms. The light changes the colors. Deepens them or flattens them. Some days are days of deep color. Some days are grey. I remember.

The scene shifts and I am slightly older. I’m sitting on the inside of the house, looking out the window at the rain. I’m watching it trickle down the window. I’m impressed at how well the window keeps the rain out. It makes me feel more safe. I like the way the water looks, the way the light bounces off of it, as it rolls down the outside of the window. I like the sound of the rain on the window.

The scene shifts and I’m walking out the front door, completely encased in clothes and a coat and gloves and the snow is piled very high. The sun is bright and it is so, completely, white out there. It hurts your eyes to look at it. And I dive into that light and make tunnels in the bright snow. I want to be an Eskimo until I get too cold. I hate being too cold. It upsets my insides.

The scene shifts and I’m laying on my new bunk bed, staring at the slats above my head, holding up my brothers mattress. My brother is sleeping above me. Just before the light was turned off, I slid my glasses onto one of those slats, thinking that it’s great to have that little shelf there just for my glasses. The light is off. I stare at the light coming in from under the door. I listen to the voices outside my room. I can’t make out what they’re saying. I stare at that light until I fall into sleep.


Peace to you.

© LW Publishing 2011

Three People

It’s interesting to me, the impact some people can have on my life in just a short time. Big things and small, but still an impact.

A long time ago, my friend Gary managed to get me hired in as a temporary worker at the post office. It was a ninety day thing or something like that. Short term work for students.

The thing was, this post office job required me to get up at some ungodly hour. I don’t remember exactly, four or five in the morning, so we could get the mail unloaded off the trucks and in position for the mail delivery people to sort and slot and pack into their bags. It was too early for me. I was barely coherent.

On that job, in just ninety days, three people really made an impression on me.

The first was a woman who was angry. At me. All the time. Why? I have no idea, but she hated me. It was clear. She made it clear every time she spoke to me. I don’t know what I did, but I think I responded pretty well. I didn’t get mad. I didn’t yell back. I smiled and I was kind and I just wondered why she was so upset. I didn’t let it get to me and I worked hard and got things done.

Maybe that’s why she hated me.

The second person was a young woman who was deaf. She was amazing. She did not let her disability slow her down. She talked with people and made jokes and clearly enjoyed being alive. It was inspiring. She started to show me sign language, but I was slow at picking it up, considering we had to actually work while we were there. But I did learn a few things.

She taught me how to say my name in sign language.

The third person was a young guy who was a temporary like me. I’m not sure, but I think he was Italian. I don’t know. But he had a slight accent that was kind of endearing in a way. I don’t think he was from Italy. It was more like his parents were from Italy (or wherever it was) and he had picked up on their accent. But, anyway, he was a political science major and he always, ALWAYS, had a good attitude. I don’t know how he did it, but every morning he’d walk in the door and move around from person to person saying loudly, with cheer, “Goot morning!” Which, at first, was a little too much. But as time went on I began to admire him. I admired his positive attitude and good nature. I wanted to be more like that.

Nowadays, if I show up somewhere in the morning, you might hear me say, “Goot morning!”  I say it just like he did. And this is in honor of him. It’s a remembrance. A stab at being more cheerful, like I should be.

All of this to say: Don’t underestimate your impact on people. The little things matter. The little things make an impression, they make a difference. And just imagine the difference you can make in people’s lives if you really try.

Seriously. Imagine.


Matthew 13:31-32
Peace to you.


© LW Publishing 2010

Reremembering

Sometimes at night, when I can’t sleep, I find myself trying to think back as far as I possibly can. I try to figure out what my earliest memory is.

I have a very strong visual memory. I can recall images of some long ago events like they happened this morning. I can remember faces, but I have a hard time remembering names sometimes, even the names of people I was really close to. I can give you directions to almost anywhere by giving you landmarks, but I can’t remember the names of the roads. I can remember pointless details and lots of facts that I’ve learned over the years, but I would never find my car keys if I didn’t keep them on a hook by the door.

Memory is my blessing and my curse. There are things I’m so glad I remember and many things I wish I could forget.
  
But I was trying to remember my earliest memory, and I find it’s very hard to place certain memories chronologically. In posting on this blog, I’ve had to contact my mom several times to get the time sequences right on things and recall some of the things said. But I think my earliest memories are just visual.

I remember a shed in the backyard of the house we lived in when I was around 3 years old. I also remember the basement flooding in that house, and another “episode” where my older brothers were teasing me in that basement by singing the song “Sherry” by the Four Seasons, and replacing the name “Sherry” with the name “Davey.” They made me cry.

Don’t you hate them for that? Mean old big brothers. (We have resolved all of our former conflicts, in case you’re wondering.)

I think the earliest memory I can pull up is some images of the inside of a crib, with some toys. My mom has confirmed these images. Apparently I had some health problems when I started out and I spent a lot of time in that crib with some plastic toys which I was determined to consume.

Do you have an earliest memory? I’d really like to hear what it is. I find it fascinating. Are your earliest memories visual or do you remember sounds or is it more about an event or a circumstance? Some people I know have almost no memories from when they were very young and others seem to remember everything.

Einstein said, “Memory is deceptive because it is colored by today's events.” But it’s also all we have sometimes. So we make due with it.

Image of human brain synapse in the state of storing a memory,
by Michael A. Colicos, UCSD.
For me, storing them is no problem.
Finding where I stored them is the problem!

Psalm 77:11-12
Peace to you.


© LW Publishing 2010