My husband and I were recently talking about how sometimes a smell or song can bring back old memories of pleasant days.
We love to talk about those memories together; quite often I learn something new about him that even after 45 years together, I didn’t know.
“Every time I hear ‘This Magic Moment’ by Jay and the Americans, I remember sitting in my room and playing a stack of 45s on my record player,” he said.
I smiled and told him that I every time I hear ‘You’re So Vain’ by Carly Simon I go back in time to the eighth grade while riding to school in the car.
I also remember riding to school the next year with my friend and her big brother in his souped-up Nova. It was the mid 70s and he played Derrick and the Dominoes’ ‘Layla’ on the 8-track. He had turned his car’s tiny windshield washer spigots outward so that as we passed people walking on the sidewalks, they would get sprayed with water. He thought that was hilarious. I just ducked down in the back seat and hoped no one saw me.
But then my mind went even further back, and I said that there are certain smells that take me back to childhood, too. The smell of the oily creosote and tar used on wooden railroad ties will always take me back to simpler, happy times.
I remember walking with neighborhood children down the road to the little clapboard store in the early 60s. I was barefoot, and crossing the railroad tracks as a three year old was tough…the tracks were so hot on a south Georgia summer day. But we reached the store, bought our candy (I had Sixlets…and I still eat them today) and headed back, hopping as fast as we could over the train tracks.
One day, on our way back from the little store, my dad drove up beside us and stopped near the tracks. With the window down on the black rambler, dad poked his head out and asked if we wanted to ride home. Of course, we all said yes, jumped in the car and went the short distance back home. But as we got to the end of our driveway, I begged dad to stop and let me drive.
It had become a standing ‘date’ that I would run to the end of the driveway and wait for him every day when I knew he would be coming home from work. He would open the door, then I would get in dad’s lap and hold the steering wheel while he drove up to the house. We did this every day. He even let me ‘drive’ to the house on Sundays after church.
Our church was unusual in that the nursery was where a balcony normally would be. It was on the second floor, right above the front entrance. There was a picture window in the nursery where children could look down on the congregation and my dad could look up and see me watching him while he was preaching.
Nothing was any funnier than running toward the picture window and throwing myself against the glass, making faces with my nose and mouth squashed up. Dad always looked like he was about to have a heart attack. He said he was always afraid the glass was going to break. Every time I hear the hymn “He Leadeth Me” I start to giggle. It was playing once when I rushed for the picture window.
My mother also lived in fear of what I would take in my head to do. One day on the front porch of the church, the deacons were gathered around speaking to my mom. I strolled up, lifted the hem of my mom’s dress up to her waist and asked the men if they liked my mommy’s new slip. Mortified, she jerked her dress down and marched me into the church nursery. I am actually thankful that I survived that experience. I think she wanted to kill me. At 83 years old, she still swears that was the most embarrassing moment of her life.
Isn’t it fun to reflect and remember those great times in your life?
I guess that with all the negativity and constant barrage of bad news and sadness all around us it would do us so much good to just take time to sit and tell each other about those past memories that make us smile and laugh.
When you are feeling low, get together with friends; tell everyone they have to share one funny memory from their childhood. It won’t be long before everyone is feeling happy and laughing. Before you know it, more and more stories will be told.
It’s a quick and fun fix for troubled times.
