Associations

Remember playing the association game as a kid?  You know, where someone says a word and you say the first word that pops into your mind (that is somehow associated with that word) – and the game can just keep going. 

Do you have things in your life that you think of and associate with other things?  Like maybe a certain song that reminds you of something, or a certain smells that makes a special time pop back into your head.  I can remember exactly when Princess Diana died, because I associate it with my being in the hospital (having just had emergency surgery for an ectopic pregnancy).  I can remember the outfit I wore to my uncle’s funeral (I was 12 or 13).  Sometimes I’ll hear a song and be transported to my teen years and a random incident pops back into my mind. 

Right now, I’m associating the 4th of July holiday with the one we spent my my best friend Sue and her family 2 years ago.  The week before, Sue had learned that she had ovarian cancer; so the mood was very “heavy” that evening.  There were a lot of tears.  I had taken her, earlier in the week, for a pedicure.  We took a picture of our toes (and now, looking back, I wish we had taken a picture of US instead). 

I remember taking a picture of  the evening sky and loading it up on the computer to see a round, white object in the center of the picture that was NOT visible to our human eyes (it wasn’t the moon, which we could see off in a different direction).  We all took it as a sign – the light at the end of the tunnel.  Sue found that light in a very different way than we expected last March. 

Man, I miss her!  But I’m glad for the memories and the things that “trigger” them in my mind.  What are some of the things that trigger your memories?  A smell?  A song?  A certain place?  I’d love to hear about them!