Weddings and other madeleines

I've had two and as of tomorrow, my ex will have caught up with me. It is odd to think the man I was once married to is getting married to someone else, but I also think it is odd that I used to speak with a Louisiana drawl. Time and place... My former accent and marriage are long behind me but I remember much that was good, I wish him and his bride all the best.

I was playing one of the records my mother used to love. One piece in particular brought me right back to our living room in West Hartford, Connecticut. There she was, writing poems or grading papers at her roll top desk--cigarette carbonizing in the corner of her mouth, I'm sprawled on the mid-century modern olive green couch rereading Joan Aiken and noisily sucking on Necco wafers, it's just a guess that Franz Liszt didn't have this scene in mind when he wrote the Hungarian Rhapsody #6 in D flat. Last night I dreamed about a magical skinny dipping college night, innocent and freeing. I remembered I'd had to take my glasses off before I felt brave enough to take off my clothes, reasoning if I couldn't see anyone I would be less embarassed. And it was so. In the dream the green perfume of late spring hovered over the water. I'd forgotten that detail... But who is to say what strain of music, what scent of soup, what remembered colors gently shake our hearts and make us smile a little, cry a little.