Monsters

There are things that randomly, so randomly, spring to mind. And I’ll only be able to remember the tiniest fraction of the memory, and I need you back so bad to help me remember more of it. One sprang to mind recently...This one I didn’t really need you for but I thought you would appreciate it. I was very little, 4 or 5, in Mama’s upstairs bathroom in the “white house”. She was “getting her face on,” and I was standing by the window that overlooked the backyard. It was morning and cold and dark and gloomy. I was watching rain drops run down the window. They looked like they were racing, starting slowly at the top of each pane and then picking up speed until they were careening past each other near the bottom. I got bored with that game and started blowing my breath on the glass to make it sorta foggy, and I wrote my letter “L” in the fog and then wiped it clean and started over again. I think I was waiting to go to school. In the memory, we have somewhere we are supposed to be, and I’m not sure where so I’m thinking it was school. I love that memory. There is absolutely nothing remarkable about it but I love remembering how warm and cozy it was in her bathroom and the sounds of her make-up opening and snapping shut and clattering as she rummaged through her bag. There is no loss in my little world at 4 or 5. In that world, everybody I’ve ever known (or at least everybody that meant anything to me) in four or five years is still alive. Things feel whole and complete and safe, untainted and just as they should be. 

Another memory came to mind tonight... when we would stay with Granny and Grandaddy, Grandaddy would play hide ‘n seek with us. He would hide all around the house and we would go looking for him. It would go on and on, with him sneaking through the house and us on the hunt, until he would finally jump out and chase us, wildly screaming, into the bedroom where Granny was studying her Sunday school lesson. Oh my, but did we LOVE for him to scare us like that. What a thrill! I was much more easily scared than you, and I remember thinking my legs were going to fall off I was running so fast from him. Why was I so scared? It was just Grandaddy. I don’t know. Little kids are funny. But we didn’t call it hide ‘n seek. I think we called it Monsters. And that’s what I needed to ask you tonight. I remember thinking that something about what we called it didn’t make sense. So was it Monsters? Because that wouldn’t make sense to call it Monsters (plural) when he was the only Monster. So that’s what makes me think Monsters is right. Because the name was “off” a little bit. It’s a little sad to think y’all are all gone. You and Granny and Grandaddy. It’s very sad to not have anyone to help recall and retell the memories that only us four had - like Sunday afternoon drives and Monsters and lemon ice cream at the Dixie Cream and Lawrence Welk and sitting  at the kitchen table, all four seats filled. I miss you and her and him. I love the memories I have with the three of you, all four of us together. It feels like a lifetime ago. I am so thankful for you all. I am so glad for the memories. It was called Monsters. I’m sure of it now.