compulsive compartmentalization

There are certain anchorpoints in my memory that I always go to when I think of phases in my life. Watching my grandpa load the tiller up onto the blue pickup just as the rain starts…bringing tadpoles for show and tell in the third grade only to find out that they had grown legs and could jump around on their own (I’ve never seen so many kids jump up on desks so fast)…hiding in the barricks so I didn’t have to go to the group time at youth camp (if that one kid hadn’t laughed we never would have gotten caught).

In college there was potato soup day. Potato soup day. How can you be unhappy when there’s a day that revolves around potato soup? More days should revolve around the simplicity that is potato soup. The world would be a much happier place.

Even though I’ve only been out of my old job for just over a year (and despite the fact that I for the most part felt lost and out of place there) my mind still jumps to certain things that I miss on some level. The long walks through the woods at the nearby by park during my lunch hour, for example. I can still remember where I was eating when Merry and Pippen ran into Treebeard (Ham’s), when Arthur Dent woke up on that fateful morning (Chu’s Express), and where I was when Shasta encounter Aslan for the first time (Starbucks.)

C.S. Lewis once commented that “a pleasure is not full grown until it is remembered.” I happen to agree with that. And the best memories are the ones that were unforced, that you just stumbled upon, and didn’t think to try and hold onto. It’s only upon reflection that you begin to appreciate it and experience another pleasure at remembering and being grateful for the first one.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 10th, 2005 at 9:39 am and is filed under Abundant Life, Life, Memories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.