Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Almost a year has passed since I began working at my current job.  This evening I realized I could forage in a grocery store nightly, if I so wanted.  I have been very satisfied wandering through life of late;  walking as though the countertops I have known for twenty years all seem new.  I tap them periodically almost as if I was verifying their existence too.  My grocery store experience was the same.  Really, though.  How marvelous is it, to walk down aisles through displays of tens, if not hundreds of varieties of tea or fresh vegetables or showcased meats?

I was tickled so much with the joy of gathering what I needed..I called my mother.  I shopped.  I talked ‘shop’….with my mother.  I exclaimed to her my new discoveries as she replied with recommendations for meals for one.  I don’t really know how many laps I made around that store, but we bantered about recipes and product sizes.  And the economies of each.

……..

The promise of fall storms now loops around us again.  Thunder against windows.  Flattened sounds of raindrops smacking leaves.  There have been times I was afraid of the storms of life, but those times were upstaged by my real fear:  What will life be like, when it is the navigation and not the storms which define one’s course? 

The only time I didn’t wear a dress is exactly the time I should have.  I pleaded (yeah, right…I was flipping out) not to sit inside and not to get my picture taken.  Curiously it happened twice this weekend.

There are details sitting inside that automobile which immediately transport a person, beginning with the scent.  Before my guide opened the door, he leaned to me, saying, “Just smell.  Have you ever smelled an old car?”

I had.  My grandparents, my mother’s father and mother, were born in 1893 and 1905.  Growing up with them during the summer months and weekends, my brother and I knew transportation in a succession of vehicles, beginning with a 1940’s automobile whose exact pedigree I can no longer remember.  It’s windshield was visored, the steering wheel was gigantic…and the smell.  Its smell was intoxicating;  a perfect blend of mohair, metal and the trapping of distant perfumes and smokes.  I’m sure they had newer cars, but the last one I remember as a child was a finned blue 1950’s Ford (or was it Chevy?  Forgive me, grandfather…)

…..

I was a bit unnerved with the hood ornament.  A dastardly looking chromed face with wings atop the mustache grillwork.  Chrome when chrome was really chrome and not metallic paint.  Nope, these vehicles were the real deal.  Soft curves outlined the faceplates for the dashboard gauges. Hung from either side, between the front and back seats were etched, leaded-glass cones.  For flowers.  They were to hold flowers….

I looked at the bolts which fastened the door’s interior to its exterior shell.  The window crank handles were etched with filigrees, now worn from years of grasping hands.  I thought of my buildings.  I would need to respect the workmanship of that era.

Now, why wasn’t I wearing a dress?

It’s funny, this life.  How is it, that riding a top a horse named Baby made me feel beautiful and stepping into a ninety-year old automobile…made me feel like a lady?

And now I think I shall dream of both.

May your adventures feed your soul, your essence, your being…

Love,

Stephanie

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