Of a Trip Retaken

Story on a theme:  COLLECTION

I walk through the silent empty neighborhoods of my youth. A whisper in the air tells me to savior the sunshine and warmth as autumn draws down perhaps its final curtain call of the season. It is a mid-week day and the working class not home; only reminders of activities spent here with the closest of friends I no longer know.

I cruise the boulevard from Friday and Saturday nights long ago; up and down in a redundant pattern as I take in each business, every sign, every bus stop and every back alleyway. The cars full of teenagers hoping to be noticed are not there anymore. Nowhere are there hints of the eclectic mix of irreverent young hanging out because they don’t know where else to go or what else to do.

I stop by the mall and perch at the sides of the ice rink, staring into the myriad of tracks cut into the ice from the steel edge on the skates. Sounds of music playing through speakers no longer there take me back to endless days and evenings circling around and around with my friends; checking out what girls had come to skate or shop on that particular day.

I tread down the path through the firs and cedars as I hop across small streams working their way down their gravity drawn route to the river below. I pass campgrounds I’ve stayed in and adventures I’ve experienced with companions long ago; eager to get away into the wild and be free for a moment in time.

I am a collector of memories; rediscovering the simple pleasures of who I was and what I did that make me who I am and what I do. This is a part of my collection.