| TRIP
IN THE MENTAL TIME MACHINE by Caren Spitler They say you can’t go home again, we’ll they are wrong. You can go home, metaphorically speaking. Sometimes the simplest things can trigger memories so deep and feelings so real that you feel as though you are truly there again. I have had this experience in small doses over the years, the familiar smell of a loved one, the dish that tastes just as mom used to make, or the familiar look on a child’s face that reminds you of a kid you grew up with. I had the pleasure of taking a trip though time and back to my childhood, via a musical time capsule. I grew up with music playing almost constantly, either my Mother’s Jazz or R&B, or my Father’s Rock & Roll. There are many songs which have brought back some very special memories. I vividly recall running around the house singing "Satisfaction" by the Rolling Stones at the age of three. That song still has power over me today. While I turned the key in my front door, I had unknowingly started my journey to the past. I could faintly hear a melody coming from within the house. It seemed soft and pleasant, I knew this song, I loved this song, I thought and nothing more. Once the door was open and I was half-way inside, I felt hit by a wash of emotions so powerful they immediately brought tears to my eyes. I was swiftly taken back in time. I fell backwards to a place remembered only by my heart. I found myself seeing the world through the innocent eyes of a child of nine. I was still unchanged by the harshness of the adult world. The problem of the day was to pull one over on my mom and ultimately get my way. Life consisted of play, laughter, songs, and dreams of a bright and wondrous future . I could practically smell dinner cooking in the kitchen, and hear my mothers laugh. I could feel the orange 70’s style shag carpet beneath me as I lay on the floor to listen to my mothers record album . The very album that would later become my time machine. In the four minutes and seventeen seconds duration of the song I experienced all the love, and warmth, sadness, and anger that I knew that year in 1972. While on my temporary trip in "the Way Back Machine," I felt happiness I have not known in years since. I realize I will never truly know that kind of happiness again, but while the song played I could feel it again. I could again find the joy of a naive and simple life. |