Have you ever put yourself in your ancestors’ shoes and tried to imagine what they lived through, or how they reacted in certain stories you’ve been told? You know, making the memories into a movie in your head and trying to go step by step with them. Seeing their faces, imaging what they did, said, wondered. Like when my father’s friend brought the miraculous picture of Mary at Guadalupe to my mother (it should have been decimated by the weather, but it was untouched). He clearly knew my parents well if he knew the importance of the picture. What conversations took place between the friend and my father and mother before my father died? And especially, how did my mother and the friend react when he handed it to her? Their combined shock, amazement, joy, tears–
I have meandered through the dances my mother fondly remembers that her parents went to every Saturday night and to which she was allowed to go with. {TANGENT ALERT!!!} Who takes their children to dances anymore? Do children miss out on a lot, or has the atmosphere become too “adult” for children to be invited? Do people still have family reunions where all the cousins get to know each other once or twice a year? {TANGENT OVER} In my mind I see my grandparents dancing – even though it seems a little far-fetched because I never knew them as young people, so I see them as I knew them – older instead of the 30- to 40-year-olds they would have been at the time. I also see my grandfather “calling”, because the dance I am particularly fond of evoking is when grandpa was calling out the Square Dance moves, and he got so into it, his dentures went flying across the room. That’s a great “movie” moment. But I think my favorite movie moment with the dances is my mother falling asleep on the benches when she got tired. I envision the smile on her child’s face as she snuggles on a coat. There’s something pretty special about a child having such fun and knowing it was safe to crawl on a bench or under it and sleep until mom and dad were done dancing.
This imagining is quite magical and sends you back into history – your history. Interestingly, I’ve found that often the old stories that would have had black and white photos tend to be somewhat black and white in my “mind films”. Which only adds to the fun in creating more solid memories from what knowledge I have.
The ghost story I shared of someone knocking on a door but there was no one there – not even footprints in the snow – is a great one to play with. I always picture it as a quiet day; there wasn’t tons traffic in our area in those days. Perhaps it was a Sunday; Sundays were especially quiet traffic days back then. I definitely see it as the kind of day that is quiet from a cold, fresh snow. If I remember correctly, they had friends visiting. Were they playing cards? That was one of the primary sources of fun in winter in those days, so it is possible. Maybe they were sitting around the antique dining room table, drinking coffee – or something more potent – and chatting. Then came the knocking on the door. Someone gets up to answer the door. No one is there…each door is checked…did all of them go to the last door…what did their faces reveal? Were they startled, scared, baffled? Did someone make a joke of it, so they could laugh it off and carry on with their day? I can imagine all these scenarios.
Memories are amazing. Picture stories in our minds that bring us immediate joy or sorrow, pain, anger, or a racing heart, depending on the memory. For instance, there are two memories my mother told us about her mother. In one story, my teenage sisters have come home late and told mom that the car got stuck. Not totally believing her very normal teenagers, they get a scold. Afterwhich, grandma, who was sitting and watching it all, says she shouldn’t be too hard on them and relates the story of when she and grandpa were out one night in the sleigh, and it slid off the road. They were also late getting home. This memory brings a bit of bubbling laughter in me as I imagine their sleigh – horse and all – in a ditch. Did it tip over? Was the snow too deep to get it out easily? Was the horse hurt? Did they have to wait for help? I hope someone came along shortly after to pull them out. It would have been cold! And the ultimate question: are teenagers “teenagers” in every generation or was that a more innocent age? (Scientifically, teenagers are teenagers in every generation and a little bit “crazy” – but the raising of children was different in that era.)
But the second memory shared by my mother always brings tears to my eyes. She told me once that while her mother lay dying, grandma started telling her memories of her younger life. My mother was quite upset that grandma had never shared these things with her. They weren’t big things – one was how M55 was all sand dunes when she was growing up. (The trees were planted after WWII during the job creating efforts.) I suspect my mother’s upset was because she knew grandma would not be with us much longer, and my mother must have wanted more of her, wished she had more of her in her memory banks to pull from when she needed to over the ensuing years.
I could go on and on – and I likely will another time, but I’ll stop going through my drawers full of memories and I’ll give you some time to go through your own. Try and not dwell on the ones that bring you sorrow or hate or pain, but reflect more on the joyful, funny, uplifting ones. We cannot change the past by bringing up what will possibly overthrow today’s good memory-making moments. Live in the present, give the past its due for learning lessons and giving us joy and amazement, so we can thrive through each day going forward. And, just for the fun of it, let your imagination free to roam, to play, to create life out of memories.
(Thank you, mom, for writing many of your memories down for us!)
Comments