Meet me: 19. High school graduate. Aspiring cosmetologist. Vegetarian. "Tree huger." No chemical harm to the body. Peace of mind. I'm shy, but friendly. I hold on to what I believe in. I tend to be a push over, but I know where to draw the lines. I'm always the odd one, the awkward one. I'm a writer. I'm a dreamer. I'm a musician. Too many wrongs don't make a right.
When I think about it, sometimes I remember the weird things. You know, the things you really shouldn’t remember because they’re not significant at all.
Like I remember once when I was about five or six going to the mall with my Mom, and I went into my current place of work. I didn’t think about it when I actually applied for the job but then I remembered kneeling on the floor and playing with the little toys on the back of the bench where you try on shoes, and I remember the shelves being finished and the displays in the children’s area set up so that you could admire the athletic shoes. I remembered that as I was doing poster change and so I got on my knees and imagined it from my young eyes, looking up to something that seemed so tall and high at the time, and my boss said that it looked great and I just smiled because of how I did it how I remembered it being done years ago.
I remember things like when I was about three or four and my grandmother laid me down for a nap on a particular day that I didn’t want to nap, and after she turned out the light and left the room I traced patterns on the plain white wall until she came to wake me up from my nap and I fell asleep playing with blocks an hour later from exhaustion.
I remember staying up late when my parents went and played tennis on the courts in town, they laid down all their racket covers and I laid on them until I fell asleep because they always played late to avoid the summer heat.
I remember the feeling in my stomach that I got on my first day of kindergarten, my first day that I was away from all the people I knew and loved that I saw every day, and I remember the way the slide felt on my legs when I wore my new shorts, and I remember all my new folders and erasers and crayons. I remember the first circle time on that first day and that snack was graham crackers and a milk carton, and my first Spanish lesson in counting and that my teacher sent me home a little bit early because nobody had ever realized before that I needed glasses.
I remember the feel of the tree I climbed in the front yard when I was a small child and the way the sky was so blue as I grabbed the ball wedged between two branches that we kept just out of our dog’s reach, and I remember holding tight to his collar as we walked down to the lake and I threw the ball as long and far as I could and he dove in to retrieve it just like he did every day.
It’s the small things I remember. The insignificant things. I think it makes all the difference.
