When I asked my brother and mom about it several years ago they were pretty sure that was when we lived in the house we lived in when I was born, and the woman was either Freda or Viola, my uncle’s aunts. I find that weird because I have no memory of ever living in a house before the one on Blueberry, but I know that the house in my memory is not the Blueberry house as the layout of the room is wrong. I also do not remember Freda and Viola, even though I have heard stories about them my whole life. I know they were at other parties throughout my life, but I cannot remember anything about how they looked or ever having had a conversation with them in my later years.
I have many memories from living in the Blueberry house, even though we moved from there when I was six. I may not remember what the front of the house looked like, but I certainly remember the back yard, the fence, the color scheme, the entire layout of the house and the furnishing in all of the rooms. I also remember a lot about the neighborhood. I remember what it felt like to walk down the sidewalk, as well as the games I used to play on the sidewalk.
As much as I remember about living on Blueberry, my memory is nothing like my brother’s. He can remember the address of every house we ever lived in. He remembers details of certain events that I vaguely remember happening. I am always amazed at his memory.
I often wonder why I have this memory of being lifted from the playpen over other memories. Maybe the hat scared me the memory into me. Maybe it was because my aunt and her family never entered a house without making their presence known. It could be I was almost asleep and noise of them entering the house startled the memory into me. I could understand having the memory if when I remembered it a certain emotion flashed through me as well as the memory, but that does not happen. It is an emotion free memory.
It bothers me that I have this memory, but memories of more recent events seem to be fading. I can’t remember my first roommates name in college, in fact, I can’t remember the name of most of the girls on my dorm wing, even though we spent hours together every day for two years. I have trouble recalling a lot of names these days.
Another thing that bothers me is I’m afraid my memories of Raymond will fade. He was always the one with the memory. He could remember where we went on certain dates, vacations, and all the little details about our life together that seemed to disappear from my mind after a couple of days. I don’t want to lose my memories of Raymond, especially his smile. It aggravates me that I can remember being picked up from my playpen but not the last real conversation Raymond and I had before he went into hospice.
The boys and I watched “50 First Dates” tonight, the movie where Drew Barrymore’s character has suffered a brain injury and can only remember things up until the day of her accident and she starts that day over and over again. Adam Sandler’s character has fallen in love with her and tries to get her attention day after day. That reminded me a lot of the weeks before Raymond died. There were many days when the drugs he was on kept him from remembering why he couldn’t get out of bed and into his wheelchair. He couldn’t remember he was dying, which is why I believe he was here with us for so many weeks after the final diagnosis of terminal, but he never forgot my name, or the boys, or his friends. He might forget what day they visited, but he never forgot that they had been there.
My earliest memory of Raymond is of him as a guy in my community college Freshman English Comp class that kept staring at me. I thought it was because I was always getting into arguments with the professor. That was in the fall of 1977. We got married in January, 1982. Not all of the years in between 1977 and 1982 are full of memories of Raymond. At first I wouldn’t date him, and then when I finally went out with him there was almost a year between our first and second date. I wish I could say that all the memories of our life together are really sweet ones, but we were married over 24 years so anyone that had ever been married that reads this would know that would be a lie. Fortunately, I can say that there are more sweet memories than bitter ones.
If I keep that early memory of being lifted from the playpen, I hope I can also keep the memory of the first time I told Raymond I loved him. I also would like to keep the memory of his smile, and how it felt to have his arms around me.
If I am destined to forget any of my memories of Raymond, then I pray that my boys will always have some memory of their father, if not what he looked like, then his courage, his morals, and his ability to love his family will all his heart, and may they pass those memories on to their children with not just their words, but their actions.
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