Don’t you think most of us have a place like that in our
minds, a place we can go that gives us comfort? We let our dreams and yearnings
drift back in time to when our days were uncomplicated and not tainted by the
realities of life. Though unfortunately in the real world there are some
individuals who grew up way too fast and never had that idyllic time in life. I’ve
known kids who were sexually and mentally abused who never knew unconditional
parental love that so many of us growing up took for granted. One of those kids
committed suicide in his twenties, several of his siblings grew up to live the
life that was modeled for them. They were saplings twisted in the winds of
sickness and that sickness begot more sickness.
Years ago I read something about how people survived the
brutalities of prison camps and the one thing that still stands out in my mind
today was the claim that people with long, happy childhoods were more resistant
when it came to recovering after their imprisonment than those who didn’t. Why?
Because while they were imprisoned they knew there was a better life for them
somewhere, someday and they had daydreams of happier days to fall back on. They
had hope whereas the people who had bad childhoods full of pain and abuse had
no default place in their brains where they could get a respite from the harshness
of their day-to-day existence. Ever
since then I’ve come to view day-dreaming of places and times past as sort of an adult
pacifier. We go in our heads to places that give us peace. And as I get older I wonder if maybe that’s
where Alzheimer’s people go in their heads only they just forget to come back.
Ya, I know that’s a simplistic way to look at a terrible disease. Alzheimer’s
is about the degeneration of brain cells or neurons, but it gives me comfort to
be simplistic when thinking about that boogieman place that scares the heck out
of all of us as we age.
Back to Judy and her yearning, I also told her in the
comment section that I think sometimes it's better that we don't get the object
of yearning because then the dream can remain perfect and continue to be a
place of refuge that we can go in our minds when we need the comfort it
provides for us. If we truly were able to move back to our ancestral homes so
late in life, for example, the reality would come with problems and changes we might not
like, then we'd have no place of comfort to think back on when we need it the most. Have
you guessed by now that I’m the queen of justifying anything that must be
accepted as impractical or out of the question?
Aside from his classic You
Can’t go Home Again title that has been quoted thousands of times since Thomas Wolfe wrote the book in 1940, he also penned these words: “This is man, who, if he can remember ten
golden moments of joy and happiness out of all his years, ten moments unmarked
by care, unseamed by aches or itches, has power to lift himself with his
expiring breath and say: 'I have lived upon this earth and known glory!'"
Ten golden moments. I’ve never made a list of my ten golden moments but that
sounds like a great project. It would give me ten glorious places for my mind to wonder
if I’m ever confined to one of those dreaded nursing homes. I could make up ten queue cards for my nieces to use for when they
visit---no one ever called me a woman without a plan---and if I appear as if I’m in another world maybe by using
the cards they can bring me back long enough for me to tell them I love them or to quote the country song Kathy Mattea made populate about an elderly couple. The woman in the song had lost her memory but late one night just before she passed away her husband came to visit and amazingly she said: "Where've you been? I’ve looked for you forever and a day. Where've you been?” ©
