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Joyland!

Joyland!

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Yesterday, the neighbors had their driveway sealed, which meant that I was whisked away to a place I used to love more than any other — Joyland.

Joyland was an amusement park in Lexington, Kentucky that closed when I was young. How I came to conflate the smell of blacktop with this down-on-its-heels fun park was likely due to the hot asphalt of the parking lot.
All I know is that the merry-go-round there was an utter delight, and the roller-coaster, called the Wildcat, was a rickety wooden model that clattered when the cars rolled up and down its hills and valleys. 
When I made my First Communion and was told by the nuns that it would be the happiest day of my life, I asked Mom and Dad to take me to Joyland. All spiritual aspects of the day aside, if this were to be the happiest day of my life, Joyland would have to be involved. 
And, dear people that they were … they took me. It was after Mass and the family brunch, after the rain had stopped (because it was pouring that morning). The sun had come out and the pavement was steaming.  The whole place smelled like blacktop. It was Joyland! My happiest day was complete. 
Ah, Nuts!

Ah, Nuts!

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Today I finished off the last few pistachios from a giant bag that’s been hanging around for weeks. I enjoyed every last morsel, and found myself thinking about the first time I ate one — and crunched into the whole thing, shell and all.

Pistachios were the expensive nut I could never afford with my allowance, you see. When someone bought them for me as a treat, I couldn’t believe my good luck. But having only admired them and never tried them … I didn’t know the shells weren’t edible.

The early confusion hasn’t stopped me from loving them, though. And they are instructive, an early lesson in how things aren’t always what they appear to be.

Throwback Thursday

Throwback Thursday

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My Throwback Thursday came a day early, when a high school friend called to tell me about the 70th anniversary reunion of the Central Kentucky Youth Orchestra. Many years ago (not 70, though!) I played string bass in that august ensemble. I was not very good. My audition piece was “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” — and still I only squeaked in.

I was in over my head from the start — Brahms 1st has some fantastically difficult runs — but I was hooked. To be even a small, insignificant, plunking-lower-string part of this swelling sound didn’t just make my day (the day was Saturday, the time 8 a.m. to noon). It made my year (s), both junior and senior. I had found my crowd: the music people.

For two years there was rosin dust and calloused fingers. There were rehearsals and parties and the dreaded tag day, when I stood on the corner of Short and Lime and asked passersby for money. There was the time we were invited to the Soviet Union for the International Music Educators Conference. Does my mind fail me here, or would we have played Kablevsky for Kablevsky?  I think that is true.

That one didn’t work out, but there were concerts at U.K. and Transylvania, on the road in Williamsburg and Atlanta, the night when guys from the trumpet section got their hands on the French taxi horns used in “An American in Paris” and woke up half the hotel.

All these memories bubbling out because of a phone call. The parts of life we think are over never really are.

Long Dive

Long Dive

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As I mentioned last month, I’ve been dipping into journals I kept long ago. This morning’s adventure was like a long dive into a long-forgotten stream. It was my voice, my way of looking at the world, but applied to a completely different set of circumstances.

No children yet, not much of a job, I was cobbling together an income from odd jobs and transcribing tapes. It was one of those times that was terribly difficult — except just surviving it made me feel whole and strong and capable.

I’m trying to write about this time, write clearly without remorse or false cheer.

The journals help.

Long Shadow

Long Shadow

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Driving home last night from book group I saw a strange light in the sky. Was it a low-flying plane or helicopter? A satellite? Or something else … something strange and unexplained?

This sighting took me back to a time in my childhood when I was absolutely terrified of UFOs. I would see lights hovering above the ground in the field behind our house or skimming above the horizon on night drives home, and a crazy fear would seize me. It was only a matter of time before one of these vessels would catch and envelop me and take me back to the mother ship.

Mom and Dad would try to talk me out of these notions. They somehow avoided laughing in my face and calmly consoled me. But I didn’t believe them. I knew the truth: There were alien creatures in the sky, and they were targeting Lexington, Kentucky.

I don’t remember when I grew out of this worry, but I do remember the long shadow it cast, the terror that fills the world when we are just coming alive to it.

Last Hurrah

Last Hurrah

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The day is winding down, I’ve edited what feels like a bajillion documents. Done some writing too, though not enough, never enough.

I come to this blank page, a page that’s been waiting for me since early this morning.

Must get an earlier start tomorrow. But still, there are a few minutes left of the business day, just long enough to find this photo, one I took walking around a farm park where I used to take the girls when they were young.

I was missing their young selves so intensely that day. So much so that I could almost hear them laughing and chattering from inside this barn.

But they are all grown up now, and other little voices fill this space.

Mind Picture

Mind Picture

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No time to snap a photo of last night’s full moon, so I tried to snap a “mind picture,” as Suzanne would call it.

I remember when she first talked about mind pictures. It was on one of our family vacations, can’t remember which one. I’d smiled, reminding her that she couldn’t share mind pictures the way she could real ones and that her mind wouldn’t always be as clear as it was then. That there might come a time when it would be as jumbled as mine — mind pictures tangled up with old phone numbers, Associated Press Stylebook comma rules and all the other bits of information and trivia I’ve remembered through the years.

But I have come around a bit. As long as you don’t take too many, as long as you are mindful when you snap that lens open and closed … who’s to say that, in the end, mind pictures aren’t better.

I can still remember with great detail a mind picture I took more than two decades ago. I was visiting Kay in Paris, and had forgotten my camera. It was April, early evening, and as I walked along the Seine, the towers and spires of Notre Dame were set off against a perfect late-day sky.

I’ve taken tens of thousands of photographs since then. But that’s the one — without film or any other form of capture — I remember best.

Rear View Mirror

Rear View Mirror

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As the wedding passes into memory, keepsake images flit through my brain. One I keep coming back to is the rear-view-mirror glimpse of the newlyweds as I pulled away from their house last Monday.

I had driven them home after the big festivities, and they were making sure I got safely on my way. I glimpsed at the mirror to see them put their arms around each other and stroll back to the house. It was the perfect coda to a celebration of love and family, and just one of the moments I treasure.

Funny thing, making memories. When you’re young the memories seem unimportant. It’s the experiences that matter. But as you grow (ahem!) older, you realize that experiences are fleeting — and it’s memories that endure. They are the rich rear view mirror of life, a procession of images to relive and cherish.

Way Back When

Way Back When

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The message went out last night after 9, and by early this morning the replies were pouring in. Would we, the members of Henry Clay High School, class of 19__ (that’s the only part of my graduating class year I’m revealing), like to meet at a classmate’s farm some late September Saturday?

It’s a five-year rather than a 10-year mark for us. But we’ve lost a couple of people since last time and, as the organizer said, “We’re not getting any younger, folks. And there’s something important about being with people we knew way back when.”

There is. Surprisingly so.

What I mostly felt in high school was how much I wanted to get out of it. But the memories now are clearer than most: The way the light came in through the tall windows of Baldy Gelb’s math classroom. (He was Coach Gelb — which may have accounted for the prime real estate.) Or the day Mrs. Ahrens’ student teacher suggested we start keeping a journal. (I’ve never stopped.)

In other words, these were years that mattered. And people who matter still.