This Reminds Me

The girls (none too graciously) and I have been drudging along doing our twice-annual household cleaning – the real kind of cleaning, where you shovel out the dark corners of your closets and wipe the funk off the baseboards.

We ran across Julia’s Leap Frog Phonics toy, which was recommended to me by my friend Sharon when we were working to get Julia home.   For 18 months, Julia and I played with this board almost every night.  We started by choosing letter sounds and playing (singing) little songs.  Then we identified letters that accompanied sounds.  We worked up to spelling three-letter words.  Finally, she was creating three-letter words with a scornful, “That’s so easy.”   We’ve not used it for months.

Our spelling three-letter words is now at an “end.”  (sigh)

I asked Julia if we could give it to her one-year-old cousin, James as she lovingly fingered this forgotten favorite toy.  “You ‘member how you used to spell with me?  You ‘member how I did not know my letters?’  Sing that Jimmy song again.  You ‘member that song?”   After a few songs and some happy ‘membering, she said, “Mom, Baby James does not know how to spell.  We will give it to Baby James.”

Memory can be a strange place.  I like to visit Memory, but I hope never to live there.   I hope I always have something or someone on the horizon to which to look forward so I am not anchored in the past, a prisoner of my own synapses.

What I have noticed the last few years is that I dwell at lot less on unpleasant memories.  It is not that I deny unhappy events occurred.  I’m not Scarlett with a “I’ll think about that tomorrow” philosophy.  It’s like the memories themselves have morphed.  Their edges are blurred, not sharp.  They can’t cut anymore.  And because they’re blurred, I have to squint and twist and turn a bit to get them in view, so I see more of what I want to see.

Rachel and I went to Indiana in January, 2007 to visit family.  My cousin Joyce gave me a priceless treasure – a picture of my original famly taken by her dad.  My mom holding David, Hawaiian-shirted Dad, cat-glasses Judy and me – in one photo – taken on our driveway in 1961, a few months after David’s traumatic birth.  I had no idea a picture of the five of us even existed.  I’d never seen one.  Not ever.  Judy hadn’t either.  And there we were - basking in a glorious black and white California sun.

I’m the cute one.

If I’d been given that picture any time before the last couple of years, I guarantee I would have been mired in sadness.  Just looking at it would have stirred up so many unhappy memories – I wouldn’t have gotten past those.  I would have shoved that picture in a drawer, fingering it from time to time while repeating questions with no answers.

As it is – I was glad to get it, and surprise Judy with a framed copy for Christmas.

I think this morphing memory is a gift from God.  I truly do.  I know other women who have experienced the same gentle blurring.  I don’t know why we’ve been granted this gift, except that in Philippians, Paul exhorts us to “Forget(ting) what is behind and strain toward what is ahead.” Perhaps as long as we have something to “strain toward,” the sands of time grind down the sharp edges of memory, and God allows us squint at the images and see what we want to recall.

I’m know Julia – like most of us – has a few deeply rooted memories that occassionally trouble her.  As she and her sisters mature, my prayer is that they see enough to ”strain toward” that they are not imprisoned by their memories.  And if they discover something special – like a treasured game, or an unusual photo – that they can share it happily with those they love.