Random Attack of Memory

I was at the kitchen sink this morning getting ready to load dishes into an newly-empty dishwasher when a phrase a friend of mine from college used to say came back to me for some reason.  I haven't thought about him in a very long time, but that phrase was like a spade turning over winter soil for spring planting.  More and more images of him kept coming, more and more of the time we spent together, the comfortable and the uncomfortable, too.

I remembered Snickers ice cream hysteria, a custom-cut wax seal, a Martin guitar, and endless conversations, many of which we managed not to argue in at all.  I remembered a stained glass studio, a high-tech lab, at least four different apartments, restaurants of various quality, some of which no longer exist, some of which will probably be in Starkville after I'm dead and gone, and the smell of his shampoo.  I remembered the ubiquitous brown leather sandals, a trip to the coast that was almost a disaster, long hugs, juvenile fights with plastic swords, and getting so mad at him I couldn't talk.  I remembered that he was always the one who believed in my writing and that without him, I never would have found the courage to push for my first trip out of the country, Costa Rica.

It's strange the things that stick, the things that stay, the shards and pieces that remain after everything else is over.  I spent time with other friends tonight, old friends and new, good friends all, and we had a great time.  Now, though, for some reason, in this still quiet of the night, the fingers of my memory are stirring the fragments of the past around looking at that which is lost and gone.  I don't know what augury it hopes to accomplish with this exercise.  I just hope that it puts all the bits neatly and carefully away when it's done.  Some of the edges are still sharp, after all.