Cicadas and Memories

Sometimes you have a memory-just there , right in the corner of your mind, and it is just niggling to get out. You reach for it and it seems to flitter off, as though it had wings and did not want to be caught and brought back to the light. Reach again and again and it seems to finally disappear, no matter how much you look, it is gone now. Go on with your life it seems to say, go on and I shall come again to visit you - just don't expect me to stay long.

As I stood outside in the slowly darkening sky I hear cicadas, it is summer and they start their songs now. I feel a stepping back in time, a memory reaching out to me.... Is it the summer air that brings back the memories, maybe the heat is what I am remembering, or perhaps it is the cicadas that make me go backwards in my mind. And as much as I may try I just can't place what the memory is.

I start digging in my mind of memories I CAN grab hold to....fishing trips with my dad that always started with a trip to the store to buy bologna and cheese that needed sliced before they were bought. And of course there is always the memory of riding on the tailgate of the car so I could jump off and go get the cans that we found along the back roads. Days spent on a blanket under the shade tree because it was just to hot to do anything else but lie there. Nights not sleeping but staring at the skies , counting the stars, wishing for even the slightest breeze to still the heat.....

But they ALL have cicadas in them, they all have the sounds I hear now as I watch the sky getting darker and darker around me. So I must dig deeper to find my hiding memory, that one that just doesn't want to be caught- like those fish so long ago.

Little me meets Big me

Have you ever just wanted to go back in time and have a serious chat with the little you of years past? Just have an old fashioned "sit down" ? I am wondering if it would have done any good, would the Little me have listened to the Big me any better than the Little me listened to any one else that tried to talk back then. Would the Little me just know that I WAS someone who knew , who could spare me some pain and sorrow.

There are so many times , especially as I grow older, that I look back on my many mistakes I have made in my 47 years. How many of them would I be willing to change, knowing my life would be different now? As the butterfly effect goes, every decision leads you down a different road, a different turn or hill. Do I want a different life than I have right NOW,or do I just wish I had not made the mistake as I look back on it now.

I think the Little me would be willing to feel the pain I felt as I made each mistake- just to be where I am now.

I sit on my bed, windows open and can hear the rain falling as my wonderful husband of thirty-two years sleeps beside me. I know just a door down from where I sit is a room with two sleeping girls snuggled together after hearing me read to them . Just down the hall into the kitchen is a common sight of two teenage boys, laptops glowing in the dim lights, each lost in their own worlds of Pokemon and Neopets. I am missing my 18 year old this night as she is off a few states away , but thankfully she will be home tomorrow night- safe back in the folds of her mother once more. Just one street over is a married daughter, my oldest child - her family of two girls and her husband sleeping safely. Then just one more street over and I have my oldest son- his wife and three girls no doubt asleep and dreaming happy thoughts as well.

Would I be willing to change all this, just to keep away some of the pain I have lived to get here, or would I be okay with knowing it is so worth it in the end. Would Little me make different decisions that would make this life no more.

Maybe I don't really want to have that sit down chat after all.

Birthdays and Special Days

I

t is really amazing to me how each of us have a day that is so special to us, but means nothing to the rest of the world. It just passes them by and they never know that is is OUR day, a day we add a new page to our book of life, a new year to our lives. We have our memories from that day that no one else has, that no one else can feel as we do.

Today is one of those days. It is not MY birthday, but my son-in-law Jonathan's instead. It seems as though he has been a part of my life a lot longer than the 10 years he has really been. He fits in so well with us, he is just another one of the group now, and I can't imagine life without him. He is turning 31 in 3 days, but that will be on a Tuesday and today is Saturday, THE time to have a party. So today, we celebrate HIS day, his time to add a new year, a time to make new memories that are solely his.

I look back on my life, with 47 years under my belt now, and think of being his age again. At 31 I was expecting baby #4. I had so many wants at that time- I wanted to hurry and get past the puke time in this pregnancy, I wanted just one day to spend sleeping, I wanted to just get older and get on with it. My kids were 15, 12 and 3- yes there is a bit of a space there :) And I was adding a new page, a new year, and lots of new memories.

It never fails to amaze me the importance we put on our days, we remember the exact day, even see the days in the time on a clock. Yet everyone else around us has no idea why that day, or that time means so much to us. It is so fun to find "twins" for our birthdays, then it is even cooler if it is the EXACT day as ours.

I have so few birthdays that I have memories of , I guess that is why I treasure the ones I do have. There is so MUCH in my life I don't remember- I guess there was too much pain in my life when I was younger. In fact I don't remember too much of my life before I met Ricky. And THAT day I have etched in my mind for ever.

But that is a whole other chapter.

Kids and "me time"

S

eems like every year starting the end of May the cry of "my kids are driving me crazy" seems to be heard all over town. The kids are home from school for 3 months and so many parents have no idea how to keep them occupied and keep their sanity at the same time.

See I have never had that problem in my entire parenting life...I am a homeschooling mommy.

My kids have been by my side for every day of their lives, minus an overnight trip to grandmas or a sleep over with friends. I never get them ready for school and then hurry them out the door to be apart from me for hours everyday. I wake with them in the morning and eat lunch with them each afternoon. I have them under my feet as I sweep the house, and love tripping over them. I hang laundry with them describing the new things they learned in their Science book and wash dishes to their Math questions, and I have more than once given a Spelling test while I made the beds in the morning.

Every day I hear them waking up, I hear their complaints over "nothing to do" , I hear their fears, their dreams, their questions. I have time to BE with them, and as I age and can no longer do for them I am assured they will be there for ME. I have forged bonds with my children that I hope to continue to strengthen as they age and mature and move out to start their own families. I almost never tire of being with them all day, I almost never feel the urge to hurry summer so I can send them away for hours at a time. I usually enjoy my time with them.

But what about those times that I just need some "me" time? What do I do then??

I have to admit there are times when you just really want to be able to lock the door and stare at the walls for a few minutes without the siren call of "mommy" rising from the other side of the door. I sometimes tell my kids, "I am NOT your mommy, she left and told me to watch you till she got back". Just every once in a while I just want to be V-Ann, and not just "mommy". What then?? Well, I pack my bags and head away- to Starbucks, the library, even just a trip to the store if that is all I can manage. BUT, and here is the secret, I spend the time I am out looking at other parents and THEIR kids. I see how they smile at their children, I watch how they respond to a spill or worse, I listen to their chatter to their babies. Then I ask myself if I want to be just me or am I happy being mommy too...

I have NEVER come home wanting to be just me. I have come home and hugged my teenagers, tickled my little ones and kissed my wonderful husband. I come home with the knowledge that I am right NOW in the best place in the world. I am a mommy.

Generations

Generations

Some times when I am in a retrospective mood I think, and I mean REALLY think. The kind you normally don't do unless you are really depressed or have just a lot on your mind. THAT kind of thinking. And today was one of those thinking days for me..
Today we went to a family reunion for my moms mothers side of the family. The "Hardin " reunion,the one where I really don't normally know many people- or didn't before facebook :)
Now I am on at least passing familiarity with most of the people there. So it made me think even deeper.
I sat watching my MOTHER, the woman who is my rock and my never changing source of hope, talking with her 2 remaining sisters. Her brother could not make it this year and her sister died a few years back because of cancer. So she and the two sisters sat and talked a lot and about everything under the sun. And there were lots of inside jokes, and lots of smiling going on there. And as I watched them I kept thinking how old each of them were getting. And as I sat and watched them talk for the longest time, I just couldn't stop my mind from reeling about the fact that THIS would one day be me, and my sister and our 2 brothers. We as a sibling group have all grown up and grown apart, yet we have so much history that we share with one another when we get together.
I sat at thought about how we lived together so many years ago and knew every little quirk each one of us had, each favorite food, each taste in music, even down to gross stuff like the way the socks smelled when they were taken off. And now , as each of us have families of our own- and some of them even have families of their own- how little we KNOW about each other now. I could not even pretend to tell you my baby brothers favorite food, or my sisters bedtime routine, or my other brothers favorite music choices. And that saddened me. Like brought tears to my eyes and I wanted to curl up and bawl sorta saddened me. And I just wonder if my mom and her siblings ever had these thoughts. Or is just me who tends to dwell deeper than the normal .
I listened to my aunt talk about how my mom was as a little girl, and how HER mom- my grandmother was as a person, and I miss that. I hate that as we grow older we have to go off on our own, be apart from those who were our first friend, first enemy, our first everything. I miss being able to run into a room and bounce my brother off his bed, to sneak around a corner and shoot my sister with a water gun, to curl up into my moms lap and smirk at my brother because I "got there first". And I know , no matter what, it can never be the same again. Even if we all lived in the same house, it would all be different.
And as I think about it, I wonder if in 30 more years my great grand children will watch me and my siblings as we talk and wonder if they will one day be like us .

Grandmas

I wear many hats these days. I am a sister, a wife, a mother, an aunt, a friend. But the one I am most absorbed in being right now , is a grandma. I have had a few grandmas....seeing as how my parents divorced when I was younger and then both remarried. And they were everything from very strict to just strange.
My fathers mother, MawMaw Smith as we called her- was, and still is, a clean house nut :). My 3 siblings and I lived with her for a few months when I was 9 and I still remember "beds were made to sleep on, not sit on", "you make the bed before you leave the room", "put it away, dont put it down". She taught me to make a proper hospital corner on a bed , and to this day I still make it that way. My bedsheets are shaken clean each morning and the bed made. I cant stand to sleep on wrinkled sheets AT ALL, and I owe it all to her. I remember many baths after eating sticky foods like watermelon and peaches or ice cream- not just a hand washing or face cleaning.
My fathers mother , MawMaw Albright was almost the exact opposite. She was no slob, but we were kids there. We played in the water in the backyard and ran naked thru the house to get clean clothes on. She taught us about gardens and sticky pecan pie. My grandfather had built the house himself so it had a permanent tilt to the floors. We loved "rolling" a ball from one side of the house to the other. She has been gone for almost 11 years now and that old house torn down to make way for newer ones. I think that is is because of her that I love country living and ways.
My stepfathers mother, Grandma Dot, was a proper lady in her younger day. We sat on her couches, stiff as boards because we were afraid we would do something improper if we moved. She would play the piano so wonderfully, and had a wind up record player she would allow us to listen to. She had a dinner bell to call us to the table for meals, and you were 13 before you sat there. Before that you ate a a table in the kitchen "the childrens table". You never left her house without the feeling you were someone special. From her I learned to appreciate tradition.
As my father remarried twice I dont remember much of either of those grandmas. And that saddens me when I dwell on it. But as I have no ill feelings towards them, I am sure they were sweet and kind.And strangely enough it is because of THEM that I want to be remembered.
I have the joy of 5 grandchildren so far-all girls. And I have the added joy of living close to them all, within walking distance even. So there is never a week goes by that they are not a part of my life. As I type this I am holding a sleeping 2 year old in my lap and marveling about the fact that she is part of me. Her 2 sisters are in the other room watching a movie and playing with my old typewriter. It is so awe inspiring to realize that she is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh.
How will these 5 girls remember me, their Grandma Davis??
Will it be the crazy loud music and hula hoop, the toys that are always available, the books and crayons that were often spread from room to room ?? Or, horror of horrors will it be the times I got angry at the mess and raised my voice to tell them to get it cleaned up? Will they remember sometimes I was too busy to stop what I was doing to come see their creations,or hear their stories?

Just how will I be remembered by these wonders that call me 'Grandma"

One of Those Days

Those days

Some days you just want to be.. But be what, where, even sometimes who is the question.
Laying in the bed in the morning your mind wanders far away, the sky just seems to draw it. Blue so blue that you just want to sink into it, to float away on the clouds so white and light and airy. The green of the trees just hurts your eyes against the blue and white. The colors are so bright and intense that you can't imagine there ever being colors that beautiful.

Those days start right, start with memories and thoughts and dreams.

Sitting in a different room from the others, close enough to hear- but not to be seen... Perfect for those days. Listening to those who are your whole life and world right now, those you know will be gone far too soon. Spreading wings and flying away to lives of their own. Listening to the jokes, the laughs, the squabbles. Trying to store them in your mind for later memory browsing...Hoping that each day will be kept alive forever there.

Those days pull you into them, and push you away because of the knowledge they will be gone too soon.

Looking around at the days business to be tended to, the chores, the jobs. Knowing that each day will be the same, yet be different in so many
ways. Knowing that each year more and more family will be gone, and more empty space and memories will replace them.

Those days you Know there is no stopping time. But there is beauty in knowing your days are also someone else's memories.

Finally the day ends, the darkness settles in , the busyness begins to slow. As I go from room to room to tuck in, to say good nights , to visit one last time- I wonder . Has this day been a good one, a memory to smile at later in life ? I wonder if this has been on of those days or just another day . And I hope it has been for others as it has been for me.

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 31.05.2012

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Widmung:
I would like to dedicate this book to my father, Billy Frank Smith who was stolen from us on June 24, 2009 by cancer . When he died I realized so many of his memories left with him, so I want mine to be around for a little while .