At the edge of sleep,
Just as Simon’s paw reaches under the covers for my cheek,
I wake at home. The corner of North Ash and Earl, in McPherson.
The brick bungalow that my dad thought more stylish than the frame one on Marlin.
In that flicker of a moment, I am ten again–and look across the hallway to see if my parents are up; listen for water running in the bathroom next door and the rasp of the Chambers Range oven door from the kitchen. Mother might be baking biscuits.
It’s a quarter century since I’ve been there. More like 50 years since that was home.
But the imprint of that layout defines my waking subconscious. And in no way matches my current floorplan.
I must consciously and with grief remind myself that Mother has been gone for almost 30 years. That I am old–and living in this peaceful condo alone, save for Simon, the white specter. And while no one is waiting to stop by the bedroom door with a chirpy and often unwelcome “rise and shine,” all is still well.
I enjoy a handful of other less-encompassing, less fraught imprints:
The tastes of Mother’s fried chicken and fresh green beans and canned peaches and birthday angel food cake with crackly seven-minute frosting. No equivalents have ever captured her flavors.
The summer evening chorus of cicadas. I dreamed it one night this week, the rhythmic rise and fall buzz saws, and went looking for the outgrown shells the locust shed. Childhood trinkets.
The Community Hall’s scent on Kiwanis Pancake Day. The steamy elixir of batter and bacon and syrup on a cold March Saturday. The essence of Carnegie library—books, paper, linoleum, pee. Peanuts from Woolworths’ roaster—hot and fragrant in my hands as we walked them home to Mother.
The emotional time-machine that graces my bed. The quilt Mother pieced from dresses she sewed: beauty, embarrassment, sexiness, self-importance.
I have lived a life many times more glorious than I ever imagined in that front bedroom on Ash. Homes and work, Bob, Dave and his daughters, landscapes and friends. Branded, too, in my psyche.
So why am I returning to that place? Why am I lingering over the experiences that are behind me—that register so sweetly in my soul? The view beyond my keyboard tonight is come-hither-magazine stunning. I will never run out of books that take my breath and heart away. I am surprised every day by the understanding and compassion of my friends. So, why – – –
Maybe, maybe in these world-gone-crazy days, I long for the refuge of that first nest. For the days when I was responsible only for schoolwork, dusting on Saturday morning, setting the table.
Maybe in some elemental way, I am reliving the anticipation I felt then. That small-town, mid-century Kansas belief that the world was good and that I could be and do to the limits of my daydreams.
Maybe it is simply the grief of growing old—of saying goodbye to more than we welcome into our lives.
Maybe it is the joyful intricacies of our beings and brains—the ones scientists have only begun to understand. Or maybe the very intricacies we fear. Whimsy at work in the stream of time. ©
