I’ve been taking a lot of trips down memory lane latley. It takes a lot of work for me to get all the way back to my early childhood, but once I’m there the memories greet me with a smile. They start to come back to me in brief flashes until my mind puts everything together. It always starts with a feeling, that’s how I remember anything. I don’t know how else to explain it, but if I can remember how I felt I can bring the past back to life. Sometimes it’s a strain, but I dig deeper until I have built a solid scene around the feeling.
The bad is brought to the surface with the good but I don’t mind. I used to allow myself to be sucked into the bad because in remembering it I felt it. These days I don’t let anything in my past haunt me, I am free from it. I have come to terms with the fact that every moment leading up to this one has made me who I am today. I am even proud of some of it now, considering them conquered obstacles. I have learned from them and grown.
My mind becomes a time machine that travels the continuum freely as it pleases. I feel scalding asfault on my mulberry stained feet as I run across the street into a sprinkler. I hear “daddy’s home!” from the kitchen window as we sneak to our ambush positions, squirt guns in hand. I smell that familiar smell of concrete as we creep closer to him. The memory shifts to another and I am lying awake in the still of the night, I can’t stop thinking. I feel thick black hair as I pet the dog that keeps me company, nobody knows but but he’s the best friend I have. Flash forward again, I feel a fist hit the side of my face. I like it, it wakes me up. The pain in my face is followed by a pain in my fists, which I like even more.
Once I get started, the memories from High Street come flooding in. I have to stop myself from writing before this gets out of hand. So many memories and I haven’t even made it to 13 yet. That’s when the plot thickens my friends. That’s when the real nitty gritty of it begins. I’ll save those for another time perhaps, I haven’t even got to the reason why I started writing this yet. Maybe I never will get to it. What I had in mind when I started writing has changed completley. I find myself wanting to add more but I have to bring it to an end before this blog turns into a book.
What got me thinking about writing this post was a memory trip I had last night. I found out that a good friend of mine is signing with the Army against my very strong and persistant advice. Not only that, but he is signing an eight year contract. I wish him well in all his future endevours and I hope he enjoys slaving for the man more than I do. It got me thinking about my hometown, the way I see it.
My mind drifted into the past again and I was blunt cruisin down a country road, summer wind hitting my face. I was wearing nothing but water as I watched a beautiful girl’s carefree smile. I was sitting around a bonfire with the boys laughing and telling stories. I was in the place I loved, I was home.
I have to stop myself again because I have even more to write about Douglass than High Street but the point is this. Cherish the memories you have and don’t ever let them leave your heart. In thinking about my friend I fell into a bittersweet nostalgia because I know my hometown will never be quite the same as my memories depict it. I left it and journeyed to a new world. I had to do it, I had to write the next chapter of my life. All I can do is continue writing out the pages of my life and know that whenever I miss those days I can always see them again down memory lane.
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