Memories

Memories are funny creatures. They slip up on you unexpectedly through a song or a scent, tickling that special someplace in your brain or heart.  Sometimes you react with a smile and sometimes with a lone tear trickling down your cheek.

Memories can't always be forced.  Oddly, the things you try to recall hover just out of your mental grasp.  That's not always a bad thing, though.  Sometimes I wonder if our brains protect us from certain things. There are pleasant memories that are always good to recall, not so pleasant ones that serve us well and then there are the unpleasant memories that serve no purpose in our current lives.  For instance, I was just spending some time on Facebook. It's not a place I spend a lot of time, but it's not nearly as ominous as I thought initially. While I was there, I started looking at friends and friends of friends and "friend recommendations."  Some of the people, I recognized from over 25 years ago. Tell City, Indiana. Newman Elementary, Tell City High School, Tell City Pretzel. (Oh how I wish I had a Tell City Pretzel right now!)  Memories started flooding back - of people and places, sights and sounds and smells and songs. Dragging Main and Carriage Inn Pizza.

As I perused the list of people with whom I obviously went to school, I remembered some of them vividly and some were so vague that only the name was familiar. I sent a few "friend requests" to ones I remembered well and hesitated at a few. What I realized was that I couldn't quite remember, of the ones who were barely familiar, who were the "mean girls," the boys who picked on me and the bullies. Isn't it great that we remember the good things more clearly than we remember the bad?  What curiously wonderful brains we have!

Yes, memories are funny creatures.

I still remember the smell of the freshly mown grass from that day.

Flood Wall, Tell City, IN

Perry County Courthouse, Tell City, IN

Random tree in Tell City - I was just happy it wasn't a palm tree!

Franklin School, Tell City, IN

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