Memories Lost and Found

Have you ever written something and it gives you a mental illustration of the memory that goes with it? This is happening to me today. I was thinking of a poem that I wrote 5 years ago. I don’t know why it popped into my head. It was from when my buddy and I started dating. I just got out of a terrible relationship with a guy that controlled everything about my life. Who I saw, where I went, what I wore. I was really not me at that point in my life. I was somebody else. I don’t really know who I was. The times that I came back to myself in that relationship I was scolded by him. He really didn’t like me. I didn’t like him much either. For some reason, I guess because of my low self esteem, I hung around him for almost 2 years. When I finally got rid of him, it took me a long time to scrape up any self respect I had. This made the beginning of my relationship with my future husband a bit rocky. I was clingy and needed reassured all the time. I’m sure that was annoying for him, but he stuck it out and helped me through it. But I wrote this poem about one November night that he and I were walking home from the bar. Every time I read it, I remember the walk home that night, our exact route, what we talked about, and the fact that it was freakin’ cold.
This is it (don’t laugh):

The bitter cold sweeps across my cheeks,
Goes right through me, and I see myself breathe.
But you make me laugh, suddenly I’m warm.
Happiness ignores the cold.
Dead leaves dance around our feet as the chill surrounds us.
I see your face and it reminds me, I’m no longer alone.
Finally I remember exactly who I am,
And realize what I want to be… who I was.
Feelings I haven’t felt in so long,
No guilt. No misery.
Only happiness, and I’m exactly where I want to be.
As winter abounds you’ll keep me warm.
Maybe I’ve never felt this way.

I don’t know what brought that into my brain today. I’m discovering that in my old age, bits and pieces of information from the past float in and out of my head from time to time. Probably the result of too much weed in my younger days.

Ah, the good old days, when love was fresh and sweet. My husband just yelled from the living room, "Buddy, where’s the toenail clippers?" Oh, how I love that man of mine.