Places Only Remembered In Dreams

1.

Sometimes I dream of a small building, perfectly square, made of cinderblocks painted azure blue. Inside is a dark space, meant for unknown purposes - unknown to me, that is - at least, there is never anyone around to explain. Sometimes I find things there. Printed pages of stories I can't remember writing. Pictures that disappear when I look too long. Messages from people I've never known.

I'd forgotten that this was a real place, a real building, anyway, until I happened upon it on my recent trip to Victoria. There it was, blue and inscrutable as ever, broadcasting no hint as to its use. I remembered then that back in those times of my restless night driving, it used to have a moon-shaped light at the door. 

2. 

Sometimes I dream of a place that is an impossible combination of English lowland and Gulf coast rice field, the glint of wetland reflecting the grey-grained sky. Ghostly egrets stalk like emissaries from other worlds. Clouds of murmurating starlings glimmer like white noise. Far away in the distance, I see the beacon blinking. I imagine the wisps of fog, the salt air at your windows, the warped wood at your door. 

Bluer Than Blue

It was about 4:30 in the afternoon on the 25th of May. I was walking down the hall when I'd turned to glance at the eastern window, through which you can see the shadow of the earth at dusk. Whatever it was that had caught my eye, there was no sign of evening yet. The sun was still high and bright, the sky was clear, and I realized I would rather be outside. I change my trajectory, turn around and go. 

Out in front, the older boys are washing their car, faint radio thrum as they each polish a side. Around the back, fleecy clouds are just beginning to rise. My youngest, in his last spring as a pre-teen, is occupying himself with characteristic self-possession. He experimentally spins in circles because he's just learned that, quote, "dizziness is fab." 

I make my way to the sunlit grass at the very back of the yard and pause for a moment. There is nothing unusual to see here, it's the same as it's always been, but then the feeling comes over me, the layering of time. It's a most remarkable effect. I take a seat on one of the ancient rocks that jut out of the ground, and notice. If I wasn't chatting with my own child and managed to overlook my aches and pains, I could easily convince myself that it was 40 years ago. Something about the air, the scent of the grass, the quality of light lifts the years away, leaving me free of the weight of age and knowledge. And yet, I know it is there. In that space between is something else, and I ponder it, despite not having the words.

My son, satisfactorily dizzy now, is singing a heartfelt song to the cat, because it's just that sort of day. We've all of us got a touch of spring fever, I guess. I turn my attention to the aged wooden posts holding up the clothesline - they might not be quite as old as the rock I'm sitting on, but getting up there. I notice one of them has a smear of blue paint on it, a smudged handprint maybe, even though there is nothing else here painted that shade. A story that I'd likely never know. The smudge resembled a map of an unknown place, and did not quite match the sky, even though they were both very, very blue. I sat there and let the feelings run through me, the weight of time and also the non-weight of it. 

Up above the paint-smudged post and the cross-piece where the rain-gauge has lived all my life, I can see the faint crescent of the daylight moon. Her horns are tilted downward, the way my great auntie used to say would spill out the rain. And she was right, of course, but at this moment, the clarity of the sky is striking. 

I think, life without you is gonna be bluer than blue, and I feel the sorrow that is the silent partner of time, the counterweight of earthly happiness. I never really imagined leaving Texas, but the feeling in the pit of my stomach tells me it's already past time to go. I tell the limestone and the prickly pear and the twisted chapote persimmon that I'm sorry, but the landscape only shrugs a little. It already knows the score. 

My youngest, done with his song now, skips back to the house. The older boys put up their polishing gear and murmur to each other as they walk away. The sun sinks just a bit lower. The wind begins to sigh. This moment - this one - in the sunlit grass will never come again. This moment is gone forever. 

If anyone else notices its passing, they give no indication. Like the tale of the blue map smudge on the clothesline post, only these traces remain.

Blue Lamp

Some months ago, I mentioned dreaming it was 1987 again. The dream ended, but the feeling somehow remains. There was nothing especially memorable about that year, yet the memories flit around unreasonably, like moths battering a window pane.

In those days, my cousin Anna was a huge fan of Stevie Nicks. So much so that she'd go around wearing her mother's antique lace table cloth and a pair of enormous boots. One of Anna's favorite songs was called Blue Lamp. This may seem strange to relate to 1987, as the song was released on the Heavy Metal soundtrack in '81, but of course we weren't allowed to see the film back then. Our brothers had the soundtrack, though (of course they did) and Anna's Stevie Nicks obsession gave the song a prominent place that year.

Now it's more than 30 years later, and for reasons unbeknownst to me, I've had the song stuck in my head for weeks. The lyrics have a poetic, mystical bent  - slightly tinged with anger - of the kind especially appealing to young girls.

"There was no message to be found anywhere in sight
Inside or out
I had looked everywhere but the only lamp left on in the house
Was a blue light"

While this lyric may evoke loneliness for some, to me it was always a comforting image. Perhaps because I thought - and still do - that the blue light was actually the message. I like this idea, that a light may be a message as much as any written word.

According to Nicks herself, the blue lamp is a real object, a Tiffany lamp that was gift from her mother.

Stevie Nicks and The Blue Lamp

In the song, the lamp is a concrete object, but has also become a symbol. As Nicks has described it, "a light at the end of the tunnel" as well as her mother's love.

While I can't relate to the idea of having a loving parent any better than I could in 1987, I can certainly relate to the idea of light as a symbol of hope, a sense of not being alone. Back then I was just beginning to come to terms with my chronic sense of solitude.

"Downstairs the big old house is mine
Upstairs where the stars still laugh and they shine"

While I honestly can't say what Nicks meant by this line, I know what it meant to me. The image of an empty house and shining stars meant freedom. I imagined being completely on my own, moving about under my own power. I could seek out any adventure. I would no longer need permission. And the stars would keep me company.

"And the light that shines through the shining night
Is the lamp that I carried from my mother's home
And the light that burns through the window pane
And the love remains"

The act of carrying a lamp becomes something bigger, weightier. A legacy or heritage, perhaps. Maybe a transfer of feminine power, or love itself.

I intuited this much in 1987, even if I didn't quite have the words for it. I still don't have the words for it, to tell you the truth. But there must be a reason the song is stuck in my mind after all these years. These things don't happen without reason.

There is still a lesson to be learned somewhere.

The Visitor in Blue

Just about a year ago, on Kentucky Derby day, we were watching TV in the living room, waiting for the race to begin.

Suddenly, there was a frantic ringing of the doorbell. We opened the door to find a figure dressed all in blue. It jumped up and down a few times and did a little dance. Then it ran away, but not before graciously  posing for this picture...

I'm 99.9% sure that's my middle son, but to this day he won't admit it. :)

The Beauty Of Ordinary Things

Okay, so it's a bath brush, but this shade of blue always makes me feel unaccountably hopeful.