Memory of a..........

Memory of a…

It had been twenty-four years since she last saw the place, and it hadn’t changed at all. Her mind crawling back, in search of memories.  Her initial feeling leaving her in search of…what?

She reminded herself, that that time had gone. It seemed so long ago since they’d left, and yet, only yesterday.

The bird bath remained in the center of the rose garden where she had placed it, an anniversary gift from him. She could see her face reflected in the mirrored water. She noticed the changes, the facial lines, now like cracks in the fading paint on the rear door. Her hair streaked with the worry and jubilation of life. Her hands resting on the scalloped edge of the concrete bowl, the skin wrinkled, spotted; what had happened. 

It began to rain as he lead her through the door, the familiar brass knocker, the half moon glass, the knob that had a mind of its own. The furniture in the foyer was different, but then nothing stays the same. Everyone has a need to create a place, fill a house with the things that make it their home. She looked at the wainscoted wall, where the old Elizabethan sofa had sat, now occupied by a leather looking, something or other. The lines of the matching chair emblazoned in her mind, the carved wood legs, the arched brocaded back, the velvet material of the arm, flat and worn, covered by a doily her mother had crocheted.

The fireplace, no longer reminiscent of how she remembered it. The bricks salvaged from a neighboring home that had burned. The mantel, a beam from an old barn. The smoke stained exterior now painted over, a gauche color that offered no warmth. The small replica of a wood stove, made of iron, that had adorned a brick outcropping near the ceiling, now a memory. 

He took her coat from her and hung it on the hook by the door. She hadn’t remembered there being a hook. But then she had begun to forget things, or rather rearrange memories, depending upon her mood. The mirror above the hutch in the dinning room, not her grandmother’s hutch, but the mirror she remembered. It had an ornate oak frame that had been painted at one time. She had painstakingly removed the layers of paint exposing the reddish blush of the cherry wood it was made from. She remembered the pungent smell and her irritated eyes, the paint remover they had claimed was environmentally safe, non-toxic. She’d had her doubts.

The dishes, a wedding gift years ago from his mother. The rose pattern dancing around the plate rims. The bottom of the cups so thin you could see through them when held to the light; a rose adorning each. Bill’s old pipe rack next to the tobacco tin, it had held the silver baby spoons at attention, until they were returned to those no longer babies.

She strolled to the kitchen sliding her hand over the dining table. The oak claw foot table that had hosted so many meals, so many laughs, so many tears, gone; replaced by a Formica monstrosity, its artificial top rimmed by a chrome collar, its flared legs reflecting the numerous divots from its feet on the maple floor.

The kitchen, no longer the canary yellow fabricated to her specifications by old Al, down at the hardware. Just a touch of red added to the mixture made the color jump from the walls, and wrap you in its happiness. The tiled counters, replaced with the artificial stone material they insisted she get back then, as it would be so much easier to keep clean. Yes, but it was a lifeless material with no personality. She had wanted to live with friends that comforted her when down and celebrated with her when happy. 

The old deep single porcelain sink, vanished. A bright shinny stainless one, in its place. Her old refrigerator, the doors, sides, everyplace imaginable covered with pictures and decals the kids had brought home to show off their achievements. 

The rear door to the porch, its six rectangular panes allowing her to look out past the porch to her garden at the side of the shed. The mullions separating the glass panes had been a time-consuming task to paint, but when completed, it framed each opening to her world, with a different picture. The snap shots she remembered changing throughout the seasons, winter her favorite. 

The old wood cook stove was gone, its black flat finish, its chromed handled fire box, and warming oven perched above the ringed top, brought the warmth from those days into her bones. The lid lifting handle, a flat bent metal shaft with a twisted metal top had hung on a nail beside the stove. Its sooty outline still present on the brick veneer. She closed her eyes and could feel the heat cursing through her body. 

Winter, her favorite time of year. Everyone would go off, work, school, and she watched as they headed for the school bus, their tracks leaving a trail, like bread crumbs, in the new dusting of snow. She would then sit and listen to the fire crackle, the tea kettle spit as the steam rose and settled on the window glass, like cake icing. She could smell the bread emanating from the oven, the clove embroidered orange that hung above the stove, and the apples, cut and strung on thread, hanging like bat ears near the ceiling. She could taste the cinnamon trapped in the glaze of the pie crust.

She could see the children, Mary climbing the plum tree, Bill, and Beth, attempting to master the physics of the hula hoop. The birds attacking the feeder, the butterflies gliding from flower to flower, her black squirrel carrying the fallen acorns in its mouth and burying them in a pattern that resembled her old patch work quilt.

Bill, calls from the living room. Would she like to sit? Sit? How could she sit when there was so little time, and so much to remember. She didn’t bother to answer but walked past him to the stairwell. She pulled herself dutifully up, a tread at a time, remembering every squeak and moan that erupted from the old wood. The railing spindle on the landing remained wounded. The deep gash, the result of Beth’s slide down the stairs when the guard failed to hold its grip on the jamb and became a luge sled, racing for the gold medal. Beth’s scream and accompanying tears, etched on her memory forever.

She visited each of the rooms. Three bedrooms, the girls shared a room until Billy left. She couldn’t help but notice the children’s rooms now, what she could only describe as undisciplined. Yes, undisciplined, but then life could get like that. She could not judge. If she had learned anything in her years, it was that everyone did the best they could, with what they had. She needed to believe that.

William Senior, had been gone for nearly two years. All their plans put on hold for one reason or another, and then, poof, gone. Not sick, no diagnosis, just gone. She realized, looking out the window of her old room at the yard below, for the first time, what it meant to be alone. She had Bill Jr. and Samantha, the grandkids, but it was not the same, couldn’t be. 

If there were any regrets, she tampered them with the knowledge that both of them did what they had to do, not what they necessarily wanted to do, but what needed to be done. Such are the results of obligation, duty, parenthood. Billy’s calls again find their way up the stairs, changing the kaleidoscope of her thoughts. “Yes, coming!”

She looked out the window, knowing it would be the last time. A black squirrel darted from tree to tree. It couldn’t be her squirrel, but then who knows about such things. She could only smile and wave good bye to her friend.

She made her way slowly down the stairs, feeling the memories work their way into her hand as it slid over the years. She stopped at the landing and watched Bill in the kitchen, busying himself with a kettle, not her copper kettle, but a bright blue enameled glob of a thing. She walked to the front door and stepped onto the grass, once again the scent of roses that no longer surrounded the bird bath, flowing through her. 

“You coming?” the words pulling her back into the house, through the green screen door, onto the missing Persian rug that she’d found at a second-hand store in town. 

  Everything was different, and yet, everything was the same. She wanted to cry but felt like laughing.  Only memories can stay the same, and that is all that matters.