I Visit in My Dreams

I want a bracelet with my Dad’s handwriting. I was looking through my hope chest almost frantically. If you did not receive a hope chest in the early 90s from Lane…then you will just need to google it…but it is what we all got at the age of 16. Now we give them cars….but back then…a wooden chest is what you needed to start out in life.

I apparently was a saver of all things …ribbons and medals and awards…and pieces of crepe paper and cards and all things that seemed like the most important earthly possessions I could ever possibly own.

I dug through old newspapers from my highschool which I glanced at my childish columns thinking g I was such an amazing writer…and read the judges scoring of my piano solos and speeches….they always make me smile….i wasn’t above average in much…but piano….I was good…not exceptional…but really quite good…and I was dramatic…but my speech teacher despised me. That’s another story for a day that will never come.

I ran across demerits that were given to me for talking….and one from my accounting teacher where he was so mad at me because I had everyone around me laughing that he checked every single box and sent me to the office. The principals wife called me in and asked me what in the world I had done to make this man give demerits when he had never done so in the history of ever. I admit….I wouldn’t want me as a student either….but even though I don’t fully remember the situation or the context of my sarcasm, I can tell you that sometimes the material just presents itself….and I am weak (to this day) to not answer.

Finally, I found the paper with the note that my Dad had left me….probably on the kitchen table …where he knew I would find it. He had left hours before me….and for some reason my 17 year old self knew to hold onto it. Dad rarely wrote us letters….Mom did all that….but when you got one….it was like the lottery.

This silly note reminds me of when all was right with the world. I knew no matter where I went in life…home would always be there waiting for me…and now…that home exists….but not for me.

Home….with the hum of Dad’s tractor as he mowed. The crunch of the walnuts and the complaining of my Dad that he just wants to cut down that tree. The sound of the water in the pool when the pump comes on. The smell of suntan lotion and the sight of hanging beach towels. I can hear the hissing of beans…oh how I hate beans…

Mom always in the garden….some grandchild dropping by…and me always always always begging for the air to be turned down.

I think that’s why I like camping….in a way….i turn back into this girl….

I had just sprained my ankle . I was riding on the front of a bike and I stuck my foot in the spindle…and caused a bit of a ruckus…my smile was that I was allowed to sit in the big lawn chair and be waited on…the pain…worth it.

Now, those are just memories….and the home I once thought would always be there just isn’t. There is no Mom and Dad to go visit….no ice tea to be poured…no plants to be given advice on…no late night ice cream binges with Dad…no more knowing I needed to go to bed when I heard Mash come on when Mom fell asleep after the evening news. It’s all a place I can only visit in my dreams.