May
17
2015
In the beginning of our marriage every morning I would play this Nicole Nordeman CD. She asked me to play the music today and memories came flooding back. Everything was new between us then. I like to say we are an old married couple but we are not–twelve years I think. Every day is still another discovery. I know she is a gift and only here by serendipity. The music reminded me of that fact.
Mar
7
2015
I don’t know why it is so hard
to get rid of old letters–some decades old. Some memories I don’t want to delve in any longer yet I save the faded correspondence. Cards with nothing notable on them I trash easily. Some letters from my sister I wonder about. The memories seem so far away. Some are bad, some are good. Once in awhile a photo drops out of the letter and the passage of time is revealed. Was I really that young once? I have grown old. I don’t want to to rid myself entirely of past memories. Friends and lovers.
And I know when I am gone someone else will probably trash them. I just can’t bear to throw away most of my letters. Part of my life is embodied in those letters.
It is so hard–patches of my history, my life is everywhere. Dates are sometimes important: they mark milestones of my past. I am always surprised how porous my memory is. Friends wrote me letters I have long forgotten. I do toss some. People have fled in the corridors of my mind. It is so hard. Clues of my history, my life is everywhere.
Mar
29
2014
I have a history with you. It makes a difference. I have to work on it. Communicate with you periodically. It is those histories that form your roots. Form enough and your roots go deep. It is those invisible ties that make you feel attached to an area. And roots take time (and energy and effort). Ultimately that is the only thing that matters: the people you have reached out and loved. That is your true legacy. The memories you have created in loving others.
Nov
27
2011
There is nothing more important than love. When everything is taken away from you, that is all that remains–love. Some people spend a lifetime building an empire and very little time building relationships. No one wants to know how hard you worked but they remember if you loved them, spent time with them or encouraged them in their endeavors. Love is the only thing that remains when you go. The positive memories you have built up in a lifetime. And for some people those memories are negative. Love you have shared with others is the only thing that really matters and lasts. Money can not buy love. It takes time to love others properly.
Dec
12
2010
She came out of nowhere. I asked my young nurse (during my brief hospital stay) where she was from: she said, “Bricktown, New Jersey.” I immediately asked her if that was near Lakewood. And then asked her a flurry of questions.
She knew about Winwood Beach. It was a vacation spot on the Manasquan River we often rented a bungalow for the weekend. It could have been forty years the last time I was there. I assumed the owner sold it a long time ago and the land was built on. I was thrilled to find out it now was a park.
I used to love getting up in the morning to flush the cottontails. There were the barn swallows who inhabited a garage there who would dive bomb every time I would go there near there. I also picked wild blue berries in South Jersey every year.
Winwood Beach was the place where I used to throw rocks at the blackbirds perched at the barbed wire and once I hit one breaking his wing. That was the last time I ever threw a rock at a bird. The Beach was also not too far from The Atlantic Ocean.
She was familiar with Ocean County Park. My Dad loved that park. We lived two hours away but we often went there for the day. My father upon entering that park would make sure the car windows were down so the smell of the virgin pines tree needles could drift in.
I also asked her about the park on the lake on route nine in Lakewood where we often went. One memory I had of that place was my sister on a bamboo pole catching the largest yellow perch I had ever seen at the mouth of a stream there.
More of my childhood memories buried came back when I talked to this young nurse. The conversation, unfortunately, was too brief. I wanted to continue it but I did not have another opportunity. I owed my father a big debt for introducing me to nature by all our trips to South Jersey.
Nov
10
2009
Your roots are not just the physical area you live in. It is the memories you have accumulated in the past and continue to do so.
For over twenty years I visited Miami. I no longer want to. My parents lived there but now both are deceased and I have no ties there. There is no longer any reason to go back.
I lived in Duncannon for fifteen years. I still have friends there but it is no longer my home. My wife and kids don’t live there any longer. I may visit but it is no longer my home.
Our roots are the people who are the most important to us. It is the people we reach out to every day (and who reach out to us). It is the lives we are intertwined with.
Of course, the areas we have lived in the past we associate with certain memories. Your roots are always invisible but real nevertheless. And is always more than the particular area you live in.
Sep
25
2009
Why do we care so much about things?! You can not take your material possessions with you when your time comes. It says in the Bible ‘from dust you come and to dust you shall return’.
I am as guilty as anyone of this. My music, my writings and journals and books are far too important to me. Yet when my appointed hour comes, I can no longer hang on to any of these things.
Why do we act as if we can take our possessions with us when we die? We try up till the last moment to retain some control of our most valuable possessions. We make wills.
The fact still remains we can’t take them with us. Wouldn’t it make more sense to invest in the things that really have more lasting effects? Wouldn’t it make more sense to invest time while you are on earth in relationships–your immediate family, your friends, your kids?
Once you are gone all people have are their memories of you, the love and care you have demonstrated toward them. You can have far reaching effects if you have invested time and love in others while you were on this earth. People you have loved have memories of you long after you are gone.
Far too many people do not invest time in others. They spend their whole life in accumulating things. No one remembers how hard you worked in your lifetime. They remember the love you have demonstrated toward them. So before it is too late, do something about it. Examine your priorities. You have one life.
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