August 15, 2010

You know those random seconds in life when you can close your eyes and just at that moment you are taken back to a specific memory? You actually feel that you are in that time and place because your eyes see every little detail; your nose can smell everything and your skin remembers every texture it has touched. These moments usually leave me smiling or with a tear slipping out of my eye; sometimes even both.

The other night the power was being especially finicky. I finally just gave up trying to accomplish anything. I decided to lie on my couch, accept the moment and enjoy the quiet. It was then that I had one of these moments. I have to admit that it is only because I forget to pick up candles or I would have been reading. I closed my eyes and all I could hear were the crickets, beetles and other assortment of African insects that give the night its music. All of the sudden I was laying on a bunk at the camp, I could feel the well worn sheets beneath me all the way down to the little bit of sand at my feet. I could feel the rust from the top bunk lightly falling on me as whoever was above me shifted in their sleep; it fell on my exposed limbs and stuck readily to my damp skin which was invariably expected from the humidity of a lowcountry summer night. There is something about the right mixture of sounds that were sure to put me to sleep and they were always faithful at the camp. It was a symphony of my father’s snoring (which could be heard all the way from the front porch); the different insect’s buzzing, chirping and gentle hums; the distant waves breaking on the nearby beach or the gentle lapping of water on the floating dock; the wind through the water oaks and palmetto trees; and occasionally there would be rain, which I adored on the tin roof. The smells would change depending on what had been cooked for dinner, but for this memory it was fried fish and shrimp. The mouth watering aroma of dinner mixed with the regular smell of kerosene, old wood and the salt that lingers in the air when you are close to the water.

I opened my eyes with a smile on my face and a tear in my eye, the smile was for all of the happiness that came from my time on that little island and the tear because there is no more camp. It is not something that can be replaced and it will forever remain in my recollection or at least on this page. So although I am across the ocean from my beloved lowcountry, I am never more than a memory away.