A Dive Into My Childhood

Write yourself back to life. 

Prompt by Amy Kay

Back to life indicates death. Why am I dead? What put me here in this state? It’s snowing outside. The latte is good except that the milk tastes a little stale. There’s something a little off about it. Otherwise, a lavender field under a golden sky. Reminds me of the magazine perfume advertisements where they had a picture of a lavender field in Holland or somewhere exotic and a willowy white lady strategically placed at the side and a scratch sniff for the perfume smell. I always loved those as a child. I wanted to be that willowy queen under a golden sky. I wanted to be that self assured, that beautiful, with a pretty smile for the world. A dream and all a dream entails. A safe place to go with a safe sky and the smell of adventure. 

  Dandelions intrigue me. Bright bobbing heads in patches of green. And they are good for consumption. As children, we pulled the yellow fluff out and ate them with buttered saltine crackers. Mum would fry the heads in an egg and cracker mixture and we’d have them in sandwiches for lunch. I loved flicking their heads off with that awful rhyme I learned at school. “Mama had a baby and her head popped off!” Flick. Away went the unfortunate flower. When I learned that most people hated them and sprayed them dead, I mourned. I wanted them all. Give me that summer smell, the summer yellow, the love. I wanted to save them, start campaigns for the rights of dandelions and happiness. 

  Then, when they went to seed and the wind blew them apart, I’d dance outside and run through the grass with them. I would take them and swish them through the air, blow them away and out into the great beyond; each of them a singular balloon with a united goal to reseed. 

 I love summer. I like everything about summer except the heat. If summer could stay at a nice even temperature of seventy-five, I could have a good summer without a single migraine. Excepting the occasional inflammatory response, I suck the summer dry. The sky, of course, is my absolute favourite part. If I would divide a summer in parts, here’s how it would look:

Sky. 

Green. 

Water. 

Travels. 

Noise. 

  I will talk about each of them. The sky. Oh my goodness, the pleasure of a sky. I have written again and again about the skies and I don’t think I will ever run out of ideas. The morning silkiness of a sunrise touching my eyes before I ever fully awake, the vicarious silence. The sensation of thunder shaking the air and sizzling purple ice through and through. A good simple blue afternoon with raspberry clouds at ten in the evening. I love all the skies. 

  Green. Voluptuous green everywhere I can see. New grass after winter, the ground just a touch chilly. The green stars of leafy buds appear on the trees. Baby stems and leaves grow with vivacious intensity and the smell of fresh growth is something I never want to lose. A pale sunshine on a garden is the a la carte of the entire green experience. 

  Water. Now I know I have said before that I fear water, and so I do, but more so if it’s uncontrollable. Like, the ocean for example. The ocean is older than any of us and I fear her for a good reason and if you don’t, you’re either very stupid or very brave, or both. Back to the topic, I enjoy controlled water. Hose water, for instance, takes me back to when I was a child and drank out of the hose or the water pump because it took longer to run into the house and then you might be ensnared in some work. Hose water has a tendency to taste a little funky, almost like dirt and growing things. I like that. Water in the summer reminds me of kayaking and Lake Michigan and Warren Dunes and Silver Beach. If you told me that we’re going to Lake Michigan, I would resurrect in a hurry. When we were children we ran through the sprinkler. We had to stay outside and dry off before we could come inside then. Mum did not appreciate miniature versions of the sprinkler running around inside. 

  Travels. This one I feel is self explanatory. Road trips? I’m down. Airports? I’m up. Teleporting? I’m invisible. 

Seriously though, my family would plan perhaps one trip per summer and it would be planned down to the nines. A stitch in time saves nine. I’m pretty sure my dad lives by that. Anyway, we’d all get up and leave the house at three in the morning. I don’t remember where we went all the time, but I remember that each trip took about ten hours or longer. Small children plus drinks and food equals horrid amounts of bathroom stops. We always drove. I didn’t fly until I was fourteen and I didn’t fly on my own until I was seventeen. That makes it sound as if I grew my wings in at a very late age. Anyway, I could write on this one for three years probably, but all I will say now is that you could also mention that you bought plane tickets for me and I would again, resurrect at an unhealthy pace. 

  Noise. Specifically, birds singing their vocal chords out at five in the morning. Specifically, small children also singing or yelling their vocal chords out in the morning. Specifically speaking, er, I mean, typing. Wow, those are a lot of commas. 

I mean, if someone could compile all the noise of all my summers from infant to now, it would take you approximately thirty years to listen to. I’m saying thirty because you would need bathroom and food breaks, and also you would either become extremely deaf, depressed, or bored almost right away. 

  So now, am I alive again? I think I am. Hello world. Lovely day we’re having. 

Linda Peachey, March 17, 2023