Conjured Memories

Have you ever walked into a room, taken a big whiff, and said to yourself, “This room smells just like my grandma’s house used to smell?”  Isn’t it interesting how something like that can transport you back to a different time?  Perhaps you were a young child, hanging out at Grandma’s house for the day, or maybe visiting for a week, where you were fawned over and spoiled in a way that your parents would never dream.  A simpler, more innocent time, when you didn’t have a care in the world and you were the greatest thing around for miles.  Ahhh…the memories.

Anything can conjure a memory.  A smell, a taste, a color on the wall.  For me, the biggest conjurer is music.  I was driving around yesterday afternoon, minding my own business, when Photograph by Nickelback came up on my iPod.  Not an old song, but the things that were going on in my life when I first heard it mean that today I am in tears before the first bar is over.  The first time I heard this song was at my daughter’s high school graduation party.  Not the “7-going-on-34” type I always was, I knew Jessie was having a tough time accepting this transition in her life, when she and most of her friends were parting ways.  She had made a video of some of the pictures she had taken of her peeps during their four years together, and Photograph was the song running in the background.  I looked over at her, with the marvel that only a Mom can possess, and I saw tears in her eyes.  At the sight of that, I, of course, started bawling like a baby.  I had to leave the room I was crying so hard, sad for her and the pain she was feeling at the time.  “Look at this photograph/Everytime I do it makes me laugh…” reminds me of the feelings she must have had looking through all of those pictures, remembering the old times, and deciding which ones were the ones to go in a video that would showcase “high school” for her for years to come.

Jessie and Krystal

Photo Courtesy of Chris Paxman, Paxman Photography

May 2008 was also still a raw time for me, having unexpectedly lost my Dad the previous November.  A song like this, about reminiscing, leads me to memories of him that are still painful to me today almost three years after his passing.  So, “Look at this photograph/Everytime I do it makes me laugh…” has a dual meaning to me.  Not only does it make me think of Jess, it also reminds me of looking through boxes upon boxes of pictures, trying to find just the right ones to play in a montage at Pop’s memorial service.  Then, of course, the pictures remind me of all the things we did together, all the great times we had, and then the brutal realization that I will never do those things with him again.  And the tears come again.  Some laughter, too, but mostly it makes me incredibly sad.

 Mom and Dad in Pompeii, Italy

There are others, too.  “And this is where I grew up/I think the present owner fixed it up…” always takes me back to Cincinnati, Ohio, and all the places that were important to me when I lived there as a young child.  Our house, which still looks much the same but is a more rundown version of what I remember; our street, which due to the urban lifecycle isn’t quite as nice as it was back in the day; the fact that the detached garage has been taken down, and Mom and Dad’s first Christmas tree, which had been planted in the backyard, has been taken down, too.  Then there’s Grandma and Grandpa’s house, still standing in all its well-cared-for glory, through which we had a chance to walk in 2006 when it was up for sale.  Funny the things that stand the test of time, and all the things that were still there from my childhood some 30 years prior: wallpaper in the upstairs hall, the fireplace tile, the original kitchen cabinets.

 Grandma and Grandpa's House

“And this is where I went to school/Most of the time had better things to do…”  Well, the second half of that line’s not true, nor is the rest of the verse, but this one reminds me that the school I went to still looks exactly the same as it did when I attended there in the mid-70’s.  Red brick, smokestack in the back, four floors, typical Midwest elementary school.  When we were back in 2006, Dad’s elementary school had been torn down; when we went back in 2009 it had been replaced by a modern monstrosity that probably doesn’t invoke education anywhere near as well.  Mom’s elementary school and high school are left mostly unchanged, and thank goodness – Mom’s high school campus is the most beautiful I have ever seen.

 Withrow High School, Mom's Alma Mater
Photo Courtesy of the Withrow High School Alumni Association

While hearing this song immediately puts me into a tailspin, I am at the same time very grateful that it does.  There’s something very comforting about smiling through tears – you have the sadness that those times will probably never be relived, but the thankfulness that the memories are there to be had.  Thank goodness the chorus of this song doesn’t have to be true:

Every memory of looking out the back door
I had the photo album spread out on my bedroom floor
It's hard to say it, time to say it
Goodbye, goodbye.
Every memory of walking out the front door
I found the photo of the friend that I was looking for
It's hard to say it, time to say it
Goodbye, goodbye.