Life in progress

Tag Archives: memories


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Just Jot It January 3rd – Frozen

There are certain things that will always be frozen in time. Moments we remember, though they may change for the better or worse in our minds, that remain static. Like the birth of a child; finding it impossible to forget the joy but the pain of childbirth becomes distant, as something we women dissociate from, transforming it into a story to be related many times as a comparison to every other kind of pain. Or like the size of a place we frequented as a child – our elementary school gymnasium, or a traveling fair’s ride that seemed massive until we revisit it as an adult.

In the interest of keeping things real, I’ve always found journals to be most helpful. As I go through this blog in the next few days and weeks for the purpose of writing a post on my 2015 year in review I’m sure I’ll find that my frozen shoulder was much worse than I remember, and that my summer was unbearably hot (it’s hard not to want such a thing when you’re freezing to death in January, no matter how miserably humid it was).

I’m trying to think of a moment in my past other than the two examples above that might not have been as big or wonderful, or as unhappy or painful as I remember it, but of course, in my mind it’s all exactly as I now imagine it was.

What is your moment?

The “Frozen” prompt is brought to you by Helen Espinosa at This Thing Called Life One Word At A Time. If you don’t already follow her, please check out her blog!

JJJ 2016

To find the rules for Just Jot It January, click here and join in today. It’s never too late! And don’t forget to ping back your January 3rd post here!


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Musical Memories

Music.

Have you ever heard a song on the radio that you haven’t heard in years, but that you once knew so well you could sing in your sleep? It’s fascinating to me the process in which a song like that comes back to me, note by note, lyric by lyric. I find myself singing along and remembering AS I SING. Whenever that happens, I can’t help but smile to myself at the sensation of knowing as I go.

The songs I remember from my childhood are the ones my parents listened to. I, at the time, was too young to discover anything for myself. This was before I had even been to a Disney movie, and it was long before home videos.

My mother and her best friend used to listen to Tom Jones and Engelbert Humperdinck (who I’ve actually seen in concert as an adult and discovered he has an absolutely amazing voice, much to my surprise), and my dad listened to Chet Atkins. He loved the guitar.

What are your earliest memories of music? Are they memories of your own favorites, or someone else’s?


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What Do You Say To A Naked Lady?

Memories. They go back, if we’re lucky, to our early childhood. I remember waking up in the summer to hear my dad mowing the grass, or heading out to play golf. I remember playing with Barbies – I had this really cool miniature floor lamp that plugged in to a battery. I’d set up a living room in the 18″x18″x18″ cupboard in my parents’ coffee table for my dolls and turn on the light and close the door. Now that was exciting for about 30 seconds.

One of my earliest memories of television though, apart from the show “Laugh-In,” is a trailer for a movie, called What Do You Say To A Naked Lady? Thanks to Youtube, I can revisit that disturbing memory.

Allow me to share it with you:

What’s your earliest memory, disturbing or otherwise?