I remember liver and onions.
I remember chicken and dumplings.
I remember Twinkies.
I remember Dittos, the pants we all wore in middle school. Dozens of 12-year-old girls with upside-down “U’s” on their bottoms! Colors: baby blue, pink, lemon yellow, seagreen. Mine? Always too short.
I remember trying to get my hair to feather like Farrah Fawcett’s.
I remember finding my dog, Sarah, in the pitch dark outside of our house. I called for her, then followed the rope with my hands from the tree where it was tied. I ran my hands all the way up to the top of the fence, then felt the weight of her body. She had hung herself.
I remember my mother letting my sister and I stay home from school the next day.
I remember my friend Kim rolling her eyes when she found out I had missed school because my dog had died. “You don’t know how I feel!” I shrieked, screamed. She reminded me that she did know. Her mother had died, remember?
___________________
Written as an assignment for an online writing class I’m taking, a five-minute exercise in the style of writer Joe Brainard‘s well-known essay, “I Remember.”
bijnke said:
Interesting!! Good job
karenliseblack said:
I would say I feel like Rapunzel, cos my hair keeps falling on my face when trying to look out the window.
Sojna Widmer said:
I don’t know if we can respond to Remembering?
What a terrible thing to remember about your dog. Sweet child to have to find you dog trying to jump the fence and getting hung on his rope. I had a very beloved cat. My mother use to let her out sometimes which I despised. She belonged inside. I think she must have gotten hit by a car once or something because she started breathing funny. I didn’t know my mother had taken her to the vet. But when I came home from high school Heidi wasn’t there anymore. My mother had put her to sleep. It made me pretty crazy for awhile. I didn’t get to say good bye to her. Hey I am 66 and still cry about it.
I am gathering my supplies for the Gelli plate class about animals. I am going to push toward dog images because I want to donate the art to PAAWs for their auction fundraiser. Your videos were awesome. I hope my blobs will be successful. The inner critic is alway telling me everything I try to do is stupid and no one is going to like it so I have to work through that. LOL
I remember my grandmother with her old crooked fingers rubbing my back to help me go to sleep. We called them “giving spiders”.
Thanks for sharing Remembering today.
Hugs, Sojna
Sent from my iPad
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carlasonheim said:
Thank you for your kind post, Sojna! xoxo
Sojna Widmer said:
PS please add me to the private group on Facebook for “Doing More with your Gelli Plate”. I sent you a friend request. Thank you! Sojna
Sent from my iPad
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carlasonheim said:
Done!
Sharon Gorberg said:
I just can’t believe what I just read in your post. Was she trying to get over the fence? The image that your writing conveyed “showing not telling” was absolutely horrendous.
carlasonheim said:
Hi Sharon! Yes, for some reason she was trying to jump over the fence. 😦
Loretta said:
Nicely written, Carla.
carlasonheim said:
Thank you, Loretta!
Sharon Bonin-Pratt said:
The weight of our personal tragedies cannot be felt by others. Comparison does little except to share grief.
My heart goes out to you over the loss of your beloved dog and also to your friend Sarah over the terrible loss of her mother.
Kat Campau said:
Animals capture our hearts, don’t they? My dog is suffering with terminal cancer now. But she still acts like a puppy, unaware her breathing problem will increase soon. She’s such a smart, sweet girl.
Deb said:
Happy and sad memories! I can relate to the hair memories. I had very curly hair and wanted it to be straight! It was the bane of my life for many years!!
Loni said:
My heart is crying for your poor dog and your memory of finding her like that. 😢
Rebecca Buchanan said:
That was such a powerful story on so many levels, so raw and painful for you and your friend. I’ll be thinking about this for a while. Thank you for sharing.
Kristel Van Mileghem said:
Having such horrific tragedies happening at an age when you are young and open, you always carry them with you, I remember such events too. For me, it adds a bit of weight and made me, as an adult, a bit more cautious but also more mindfull of happy moments. In the end there are lots of stories and a big heart filled with loved ones (and tiny comic details like U-pants), thank you for sharing it.
Frannie-Stevens-Meshorer said:
what a thoughtful ‘remembering’ exercise. Your last ‘memory’ shook my heart. I ‘stepped back’ into my ‘childhood’ mind to try and feel what your little friend’s emotions were. And AS A CHILD, having lost my own “mama” .. not through death … but watching her ‘walk away’ from her children, BY CHOICE .. me at 7 years of age, my brother at 5 and my sister at 8, I can feel your friend’s pain and ‘lack of full understanding’. I don’t know if your friend had ‘pets’ .. but we never did as children. It took 20+ more years before a ‘four legged’ family member came into my life. And now, I step back into YOUR child’s mind and I understand the depths of your and your sister’s despair. xo, Frannie
denise said:
” You don’t know how I feel !!!! ”
I can relate to this big time~
my mom died 7 months ago…my sister in law died 3 months earlier. 3 other friends deaths within the last 8 months.
No matter how sad my family is right now, somewhere along the way someone else is also heartbroken…maybe even more than me.
Today your story made me smile. The dumplings, Dittos (at first I thought you meant the paper ones) and Twinkies ( which didn’t allow me to wear upside down U on my ass because I did NOT have that body shape, the U would look more like a W lol)
Thank you for sharing this style of remembering today with my heart.
I think I will give it a try and see where it takes me!
have a beautiful day~
Denise
Linda Reitz said:
I am sorry for the loss of your pet – but this well written, short essay resonated very deeply with me for a different reason. The comment that stung me was- They were always too short! And my first thought after that is, do you still have trouble finding shoes? I know – not the way most people’s minds should work, but it was tragic all the same, eventually resorting to boys Levis because you could choose the length, and worse, boys shoes. Anyway, can you also add me to the do more with Gelli prints facebook page?
robinpatterson said:
My dog did a similar thing. He jumped up on top of a shed. And then he jumped down the other side. His lead wasn’t long enough. I was 8. It was Easter morning. Lucky for me, it was my dad that found him. He never tied a dog to a run again.