TABLE TOP MEMORIES (2011)
A little gasp in my mind; that’s my old bowl! You both used to eat porridge out of bowls like this. Mainly rice porridge; brown rice cooked until creamy with tahini and raisins
I never ate even a mouthful. You would both tell me off, but it still didn’t appeal.
I would wash it up. Scrubbing the slick remains from the scratched, whitened wood.
A pepper pot made to be twinned with another but missing its partner.
I can see my reflection in it. My own anxious face, peering in and wincing at solitude.
An African elephant. It reminds me of my grandparents. It would sit on the shelf by the tall giraffe, under the flying ducks. We would collect all the animal ornaments and play games in the sweet smelling, ever so hot, sitting room. Looking forward to tea with cold meat, salad and salad cream and cakes; lots of cakes. Outside the lawn was clipped so fine, so fine it seemed like a piece of furniture laid out in a line to dry and set.
The twisted heather root; gnarled. It reminds me of walks in the mountains, trips to the West Coast. Walking with high steps, watching the dust rise into the air and the larks spiral up, up, up. Making summer summer.
Drift wood; shaped, smoothed; a wonderful gift of the sea. So, so, beautiful in death and halted decay. My sister made us a mirror surrounded by wood like this. Now it sits at the top of my stairs and the occasional twig occasionally falls from it to the floor. I like it but never look into it. The reflection distorts me.
An ornamental box; similar to the sorts of boxes I would buy you when I had no idea what present you would like. But a pretty box seemed delicately attractive and useful too. They gathered on shelves and were never filled.
A candle; rich red. I remember evenings with flickering candle flames and how I ‘helped’ my son find one for your birthday. It was lined with cinnamon sticks. You were so pleased and so delighted that he had found it for you, so I kept quiet about my role.
Memories from another person’s table; giving rise to my own memories. Linking history into intricate pathways maybe without meaning but with a resonance in my soul that makes me think that once it was so good and now. Now the temptation is to say it is all so bad but, no. it isn’t bad, it is different with a whole new set of meanings to be attached to the objects, treasures and memories of my life.
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