Category: memory

Laughing on an old brown leather couch.

From August 2014.

One of my dad’s favorite comedians has always been Robin Williams. For as long as I can remember – I have been obsessed with my dad’s laughter.

I think it soothes me. It lets me know that in that moment everything is good. We are all safe. Whenever I have the chance to snag my dad away so we can watch a comedy or a stand-up special – I do just that. When he laughs really hard he makes a lot of movements and eventually it just all becomes one big wheezy sound. Sometimes he laughs so hard that he cries. And we spend the next few days repeating our favorite lines to each other and laughing all over again.

That smile. That laugh. Two of my favorite images in my short lifetime.

Today, we watched a Robin Williams stand-up, followed by an interview. My mother and I on one couch, my dad on the other, and my younger brother passed out on their bed. I watched beyond the images moving on the screen. I looked for small remarks made by Robin, that today, mean a hell of a lot more than they did years ago. Words showing the darkness that lived within him as much as he worked at making others happy and full of laughter.

I realize that he has left us with all of these gems to assist in our laughter for years to come. He is still here. The man that he let us know. All of the different masks that we were privy to.

I also look to the man to my right, my father, and feel the warmth of comfort deep in my belly.

Things are okay.

They could be better.

They could be worse.

But we are here together. Alive. Breathing. Laughing. Smiling. Eating. Drinking.

I make a promise to myself today to pay more attention. To the underlying message in the words spoken by those I love the most in this bittersweet moment. I will not just listen, but hear. I will not just watch, but see. I will not just say, but do. I make a promise to look beyond what they think their eyes are telling them. To see the pain. The dark. The hurt.

I also know that it has never been more clear that when my mother and father no longer inhabit this earth physically with one another but with me – that their words, their laughter, their faces, and their movements will live in

my heart,

my soul,

my mind,

my bones,

my cells.

I will always remember all of the times we laughed so hard that we cried on the scratched up, with years, brown leather couches in the living room.

–S.

Close – October 2014.

He is 9.

I am 22.

Tonight, we laid intertwined in our parents’ bed. His legs over mine. My left arm under his head. The fan blowing cool air over our rumpled clothes clad bodies. ‘I Heard the Party’ by Gem Club was playing through the computer speakers.

Tears run down the sides of his face. He told me that he remembered this song. I’d played it weeks ago in my room and when he heard it for the first time, he cried.

It makes him sad. When I ask him why he is crying he tells me that he doesn’t want any one of us to die. That he wants us to always stay together.

I promise him that we won’t die.

I don’t want to crush his innocence tonight. I just want him to be able to feel whatever his heart feels while he listens to the song. I know that society will soon try to shut down this emotional side of him. But he has a very big heart. I hope that it always comes out on top.

The second time we play it, tears run down the sides of my face. Although we are not necessarily crying about the same things, we are one. We are feelers. We get deeply connected to things. Our happiest moments seem to be lined with a little bit of sadness.

And we don’t have to talk about it.

We just let the melody and the lyrics of the song do that for us.

Even though we’ve barely exchanged four sentences the entire day – in this moment, we are closer than we have ever been.

Both mourning something that has yet to come and that we cannot explain.

–S.

A Perfect Day – Eleven Years Ago.

I took my little brother out for hot dogs, ice cream, and some hardcore dance sessions during the car ride to retail therapy outlet mall.

Every time I think I know everything there is to know about that nine year-old boy, he surprises me.

He no longer eats his hot dogs plain. They are topped with ketchup and mayonnaise now.

His favorite song range from Lana Del Rey to Daft Punk (which he calls Drift Punk, and he tells me that EVEN our dad knows that’s their band name).

As I shift through the three radio stations I generally listen to, he directs me to stop at the ones that play the first song that catches his attention.

I lower the music to point out the airplane in the air, or the dog on the sidewalk with its owner, and he nods and smiles quickly, and turns the music back up.

He still misses our cats and dogs that have passed, and doesn’t quite understand where they go.

He closes his eyes and gets lost in the music.

He moves his head to the beats and pretends to know the lyrics as he lip sings.

Sometimes he actually knows the lyrics, and I look over in surprise, and he gets shy, lowers his eyelids, and stares away with a secret smile.

He gets the cone with vanilla ice cream, dipped in chocolate, with some crushed nuts.

He has an ice cream mustache the entire time, and while I am driving – I am frantically looking for something to wipe his mustache away. I forget in moments like this that he is nine. He can wipe his own mustache – if he really wants it gone. He is almost growing out of all these things.

He will eventually stop asking me to open his coke, or rip open the ketchup packet, or help him pass a level on a game. He will start doing these things independently.

Along with this – our dance sessions while riding in the car will become rarer.

It’ll start becoming embarrassing for him to do so and he will become old enough to stay home by himself and pick playing Halo 4 over going to Target.

I like to write about these emotions, these memories, because one day they will fade as well. I won’t remember them quite as vividly. I won’t remember that I was wearing my aqua button-up shirt with skulls and roses – that is way too big for me now because I’ve been losing weight. I won’t remember that E smelled like my dad’s aftershave because he says it holds for 72 hours. I won’t remember that we actually saw a woman who was crossing the street get hit by a car with our own eyes. I won’t remember that he didn’t get ice in his drink because he says his Dr. Pepper will start tasting like water. I won’t remember that he had a small red pimple on the front of his nose. I won’t remember that he wore his Champion sweatpants backwards for the second day in a row.

One day it won’t be hot dogs, ice cream, and dance. For E, it might be girlfriends, skateboards, and staying up late. For me, it’ll be a career, paying off student loans, and going to sleep early. I hope we always at least vaguely remember a time when life was simpler. Moments where we were infinite with David Guetta blasting in the backyard, ice cream mustaches, and soda highs.

–S.

Running.

I don’t really remember running.

I’m sure I did as a child, and was forced to during the annual fitness test, and for certain gym class activities.

But you know your brain can block out traumatic experiences, so I’m sure that’s what happened.

I always saw it as something only ‘skinny’ people could do, so why bother?

I walk at least an hour every day now and it never fails that I see at least one person running.

For a second, those old feelings hit me:

You can’t run.
You’ll never be able to run.
You’ll never have a runner’s body.
On and on they go.

Lies that I tell myself that I’ve collected over the years – I don’t even think half of the statements are true.

So, I called bullshit today.

I’ve known since last night that I was going to attempt to run today, so I stalled all day.

Around 5p, I was hitting the – yeah, I’m tired of working out every day, mood, y’know – good old self-sabotage.

Then I walked half a mile to the Elementary School behind my house – skinny women in sports bras, flat stomachs showing, everywhere on the track.

The Universe must hate me.

And then my feet hit the pavement, and something happened.

I ran.

I really believed that I couldn’t – wholeheartedly.

Like I really thought I’d make it about 5 steps and pass out. Roast in the Texas sun like a glazed honey ham – only to be found in the morning by a bird taking a shit.

I ran a total of .75 of a mile.

Something big happened.

Something shifted in me.

I thought of every time that I said NO to something because of my weight without even trying, but today I said YES to a future of trying.

I’m not a runner. Nor am I skinny. Nor do I have a runner’s body, whatever the fuck that is, but I ran today and felt alive.

–S.

Black Boots.

2014.

I’m driving home.

It’s 2:32 in the morning.

It’s chilly in Texas now.

More late at night than during any other time of the day.

I wonder what the weather is like where you are. I turn the radio on, and I hear Justin Timberlake taking back the night.

I wonder what you’re listening to nowadays. Are you playing your piano?

I turn the radio off. I don’t want to take back this night. It’s beautiful. I want to burn it into my memory forever. It’s truly been special and I haven’t done anything special in quite some time. When I am wearing my faux leather black boots, I feel like I can do anything. I wore them tonight. If we still spoke, you’d know about them. I would have sent you a picture. I was dressed in all black with touches of gold jewelry. I felt sexy and mysterious all wrapped into one with a ribbon on it.

I laughed a lot tonight. Real laughter. I meant all of it.

And there was this moment when I was driving home, and the air was blowing aggressively against my face, that I missed you.

I really really missed you.

I wondered if you were at work maybe thinking of me too.

I wanted you to wrap your words around me and bring me warmth the rest of the car ride home.

I wanted you to lay me down on my pillow and sing me to sleep.

Your deep low timbre.

I would do anything to hear your smile – even over the telephone.

I don’t even need to see it, it would be enough.

Just to know that it was my smile. For me. Because of me.

If it’s cold where you are, I wish you warmth.

I wish you the sun.

–S.

I remember those faux leather black boots. I wore them into another love story. They were my favorite boots to dance in downtown. Eventually – one of them started coming apart and I would use black tape to keep it together. I was wearing them in dimly lit bars and clubs, but also didn’t give a fuck if anyone noticed the tape.

I loved those black boots. I LIVED in those black boots.

RIP Faux Leather Black Boots.

Wet Eyelashes.

Rain always reminds me of a moment from five or so years ago.

I’m in my second or third year of college. It’s raining really hard. I’m wearing flip-flops, as per usual, and I don’t have an umbrella. I’m also parked in visitor parking because I’m a commuter and can’t always afford the luxuries in life – like a parking pass. So, I’m in visitor parking, down an incline, the furthest spot on the campus from any classroom.

I step out into the rain from the cover of the parking garage and immediately get splashed by a car that is passing by – probably by someone who can afford life luxuries like parking passes. I think to myself – this moment is a metaphor for something I can’t quite connect yet – it will come to me later. This moment also sets the tone for the rest of my day.

But it doesn’t – because there he is, like a night in shining armor.

He’s actually not much older than me,  a student, in a beat up old truck – asking a rain soaked girl if she wants a ride to class. Before I can answer, he assures me that he’s not a psycho or a total weirdo. At this point, I don’t care what he is, I’m getting in the car.

I’m in the car and I’m wet, but I’m warm.

I’m warm and making small talk with a stranger.

I’m going to be on time to class.

Wet, but on time.

I  can’t remember details about his truck, just that it was beat up, noisy, and old.

I can’t remember his face or his voice or what we even said in the short distance between us in the front of his truck.

But I can remember feeling warm, inside and out, due to this act of kindness by a stranger whose name I never found out.

This is the moment I always think of when it’s raining.

I imagine him somewhere as some girl’s prince charming. Rescuing a cat from a tree, tending to a baby bird with an injured wing, helping a blind man cross the street, giving a stranger a ride in the rain, feeding the homeless, kissing a paper-cut before placing a band-aid over it, changing someone’s tire on the side of the highway, waiting up for you to get home – making people feel warm.

Today – I am standing under an awning in front of a department store watching a downpour. The entire sidewalk is wet except for a few millimeters in front of my black flats.

I guess I’ll wait for it to turn to a sprinkle or a drizzle before I make a break for my car.

But then I’m stepping into the rain and I’m soaked in seconds. I think to myself – this moment is a metaphor for something I can’t quite connect yet – it will come to me later. My flats are soaked through, so I stop to take them off, but I don’t run.

So, I’m just a rain soaked girl walking barefoot across a parking lot to my car.

I get into the car and I look into the rear-view mirror.

I am

gasping

smiling

laughing.

Rain is rolling down my eyelashes.

I am

living.

Rain reminds me of being alive.

–S.

Something Sacred.

Years ago, when we were broken-up, flirting with the idea of being together again, you kissed my ankle one desperately hot Texas night.

And that one innocent moment, held me for a long time, and still holds me today.

It hits me at random times. I can still see you kissing my ankle. And if I close my eyes really tight, I can almost feel it again. Even now.

I can still see you above me, the look in your eyes, holding my right leg up.

Tender.

Sacred.

Smiling.

Loving.

–S.