letters

dear J.M.,

there are certain situations, or settings--whatever you want to call them--that unfailingly remind me of you.

two nights ago was one of them: i'd just come home from running, it was nearly sunset and a little bit humid outside, my housemate was making the same kind of gorgeous and simple dinner i always associate with your house...and i guess that's what did it. suddenly i felt like i was back in annapolis, just starting another school term. the weather, the look and smell of the house, the feeling of coming home...those are all inseparable from memories of the M. house.

right now, it's about 10am on a saturday morning. it's chilly, the fog hasn't burned off yet. i took my tea into the back screened porch, wrapped myself up in a blanket, heard the birds shrilling, and this song by alexi murdoch came on...and suddenly there i was, in your living room.

i don't remember ever listening to alexi murdoch, in particular, at your house. i know there were several times i was wrapped up in a blanket there, drinking tea, on foggy weekend mornings but also on winter evenings and fall afternoons and every hour in the day, in the year.

so it's not a specific memory i'm recalling. instead it's an overall feeling that my brain, or my heart (whichever organ is responsible for these things), has given a one-to-one correspondence with you, your family, and your home. it's a feeling provoked by some combination of the following factors: candlelight, rows of old books on the shelf, the smell of lavender, a certain kind of guitar-heavy music that conjures up visions of driving through foggy mountains or migrating birds, the chill of early morning or late afternoon, and (always) the feeling of coming to rest for a while.

i love it when it shows up, this memory/sensory association that defies time or reason. my life will be so much poorer, if it ever changes.

i love you.

--bird