Don't You Remember? ·Adele

     A card came in the mail today for my 85 year old father.  It was a sweet message from a family member with pictures of beautiful young children.  As I looked at the photographs with him I found myself saying the words I seem to be saying quite often these days..."Don't you remember?".  I patiently tried to explain who everyone was but there is a frustration that comes with this job.  While I tenderly try to jog his memory parts of me want to scream at him for forgetting such vital information.  It is a constant job of planning, worrying, explaining and clarifying.  The basic things are lost.  The common are forgotten.  The scary part comes when I realize that I will be one of those forgotten as well.
     Memories are bittersweet these days.  I wake in the morning from dreams of a lost mother.  So much was left to do.  My father's memory of our life slips in and out like the tide.  My children seem to grow at such a pace lately that to remember them tiny almost seems too painful.  There are also the crushing memories of a couple who spent half of their lives together.  I even feel sadness for the me that was lost along the way and fear of not being able to find her.  My first thought of the memory of any of these things bring a smile...only to be replaced in the next moment with the heartache that goes in the acceptance of the losses. 
     I have been living the past few years in the moment.  I have been forced to think again about the future.  But tugging at my every thought...is the past...and it has one hell of a grip on the rope.  Last weekend I found myself out for a few hours at the local pub.  It was Homecoming for my college.  It's been about 17 years or so since graduation.  Just enough time to make you feel nostalgic for a simpler time long gone.  I had a few moments of "Don't you remember?" as I bumped into a familiar face here and there.  Tug.  Tug.  Tug.  I also celebrated a tenth birthday with a little girl I have watched grow up.  Pull.  Tug. Pull.  I then chatted with a cousin and did more of the "remember when" that seems to happen when old buddies or family members reminisce.
     How do we live today and move on to new tomorrows with the "Remember the times..." that seem to happen so often?  The feeling of the remembrance has a second wave that accompanies it...one that just wants to go back.  Unfortunately, the rope only pulls hard enough to torment us and not hard enough to bring us back in time.  Somehow we must just keep going.

The leaves of memory seemed to make
A mournful rustling in the dark.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow