Not a Book Review

No book review at this moment. Don’t worry, I have some in the works, I just can’t seem to find the words for them yet. Or rather, I can’t pare down the words I have. Anyhow, they’ll be along shortly ... in the meantime, I thought I'd share some other thoughts with you.

As I was walking into the library today I had a random memory from childhood. I’m always surprised and pleased at the things that trigger these remembrances. Today it was a sidewalk grate. You know, one of those big ones that you can’t see to the bottom of, and sometimes you can hear air rushing around inside of. There are a few of these along one side of the building, and in that second when my foot was in the air above the grate, about to take me across, I wondered if a rush of air would meet me once I was standing over it (I was wearing a dress, and one has to be mindful of these things you know). There was no air, but this thought catapulted me back a good 18 years at least, when I would visit my dad for a week or two at a time in the middle of summer. On Sundays we usually went church, and ours had these skinny little air conditioning vents along the walls next to the pews. I remember just how it felt to walk over these vents after coming inside from the sweltering Texas heat. A rush of cold air on bare legs, the flutter of a dress or skirt against my knees as we walked through the hushed sanctuary looking for my grandma, aunt and uncle. Refrigerated air was so exotic to me in those days because my full-time home with mom had a swamp cooler ... much more efficient for the desert air, but not nearly as satisfying as the chilled air that the Texans produced.

All that from a random air vent/grate in the sidewalk. I hadn’t thought about that in years. I think that being around kids and children’s books has helped opened up the memory bank, although I often find myself stumbling on memories from childhood. Many of them are triggered by sensory things. Smells, tastes and sounds have a particularly strong hold on my the thoughts of past years, and I always love what gets dredged up without warning.