Patchwork's Page
Everybody needs a place where they can just "kick-back" and relax. Welcome to that place. This is purely for comfort. It could be a cozy room with a fireplace right off the kitchen. There is an overstuffed sofa, a recliner, a few tables, an oriental rug on a hard wood floor and a stereo. Imagine the walls having paintings of cottages and wild flowers. The colors are mauve and blue. There are shelves with photographs of loved ones. There are candles on the tables and (of course) a few patchwork quilts there to wrap yourself in. Stay a while.... have some tea.... let's spend some time together..............
I remember what it was like growing up on Long Island. Days were spent so carefree. There were so many kids and so many ways for us to occupy ourselves. We didn't watch tv when we could be outside. There were no video games. Instead, we created our own games. We were so inventive. Every summer we would strut our stuff for our parents in a musical show. We planned for weeks and practiced every day and watched our fathers smile as we made mistakes, and our mothers cry as we sang. We made tents from blankets draped over clothes lines. We played red-rover and all the traditional childhood games. We were "good kids" having neighborhood carnivals for charity. We respected our parents, our teachers and each other. There were Kool-Aid stands at the end of our driveways. Little did I know that these early relationships would continue throughout our entire lives.
Those were the days of the unlocked doors. The annual 4th of July neighborhood bash to celebrate all of our July birthdays was the highlight of the year. We shoveled each other's driveways in winter. We ate together, played together, slept together and fought together. Our mothers took care of each other's children as if they were their own. It was so simplistic, yet it gave me security and it made me the mother that I am today.
Several years ago, I returned to the old neighborhood. I hadn't been there for 20 years. I will never forget what happened to me that day as we drove up the street. The houses were the same, yet different. The trees had grown as tall as the houses, creating shade where I remembered sunshine. I saw people I hadn't seen in many years. We were no longer the little girls in our sunsuits with elastic, or the little boys with baseball hats and dirty faces running after the Good Humor ice cream truck. We were brought back to say good-bye to one of us. The first one of our group of children to leave this earth. While many of our families had stayed in touch all those years, it was the first gathering of the entire group in 20 years. As we shared our memories and our loss, it was as if we were transcended in time back to our childhoods. Only instead of grieving over the loss of a doll or a favorite blanket, we were grieving together over the loss of someone who touched many lives. We grieved over the loss of our youth, our innocence and our past. We were children again, together, and what we shared that day can only be compared to a piece of heaven coming down and touching us. It was a day washed with tears, memories and love that most people never get to experience.
I remember venturing into the
house in which I grew up. The people who live there now shared with
me the security they have that was once mine. I was shaking as I
walked into what used to be my bedroom. It was exactly as I had remembered
it all these years. I could almost hear my little princess telephone
ringing. I saw touches that my father had made, still untouched and
still being appreciated. I looked into my brothers' room and
remembered the matching bedspreads and curtains. But when I saw the
kitchen, it was nothing like the kitchen in my memory. I had remembered
it as the focal point of my mother's life. I think we spent more
time in there than in any part of the house. I was completely unprepared
for how small it really was. It was painful to see. I wondered
if I had misjudged my entire childhood. But then I realized that
the kitchen was indeed small, but large enough to hold a lifetime of memories.
Maybe that is why my kitchen is my favorite room. Maybe that is why
I chose to tell this story from the comfort of where my dream kitchen is.
All I know is I am blessed with the childhood I had. I can only hope
that my children grow up remembering our kitchen to be everything I remembered
my mother's kitchen to be.