Photographic Memories.

This was week one. Cleverly, the teacher (Pippa McCathy) had cut out
a lot of images from magazines, and asked us to select three to write about.
I just walked up to the table, and without thinking, grabbed the first three
that came to hand.
They somehow related to each other, two girls on motorbike, and young man
throwing water from a homemade bucket and a beautiful young woman with
a green piece of fabric between her hands.
I could have chosen a landscape or flowers. But I'd grabbed people in all
three photos, and they were all darkskinned...



Photographic Memories.

The door slammed, making him jump out of his reverie. The photographs were scattered over the table top, curled up at the edges, some torn, most faded.

Every single one of them carried with it a memory so strong he could almost smell and taste the sensations they brought back to him. The heat of the food. Spices and colours the richness of life itself. He had eaten his fill, stuffing the flavours into his mouth as if he would never again need to eat. The sweetness of that satisfaction flooded his memories and made his mouth water.

Three photographs in particular brought tears to his eyes, he held them lovingly in his dark work worn hands and looked again. It had been a long time since he called to mind those early years long forgotten. But now as fresh and raw as if it were yesterday.

The first; a young dark skinned man, strong and working hard in the field, the water from his makeshift bucket frozen in mid air as he watered his crops.

His eyes blurred as he struggled to focus on the second image, the joyful smile of a young woman, arms extended and flying like the wind with the green fabric between her hands billowing. They had played together at the riverbank floating boats along the shore, their sticks entwining. Had she too grown old like him? Did she have a family, husband, children, and grandchildren?

Did she remember the whispered dreams now long faded? They had been playmates and the time seemed endless as the days, blending into the heat haze like a blur. Untroubled by the weight of adulthood they played, with dust turning their feet black, as if they had shoes on. They ran to the river to splash away the dirt laughing and soaking each other in the diamond droplets.

In the third image two women smiled happily from the back of the motorbike grinning at an unseen photographer.

Gazing out of the window, the dark clouds were gathering, bringing with them a promise of rain. He let his mind wander back to happier times, the memories washing over him like a comforting wave of warm water, pulling him under into the depths.

Where were they all now? That young man, so strong and sure, so unafraid of life’s challenges.

He remembered with a rueful smile how the girls on the motor bike had laughed for his camera, then flirted with him, until he offered them a drink from his flask… and them draining it to the last drop giggling at his surprised face.

He had lived his childhood and left his youth in the sun. Loving and laughing with these women their wide white smiles, and easy movement. They danced and worked together under the hot sunshine. The days long and hard, the nights slow and mellow. Where had those years gone? It seemed like only a moment ago that he had gazed at the familiar faces of his beloved friends.

They had kept in touch, at first. Letters back and forth, and photographs, like the ones spread on the table before him. They were a constant reminder of the days in the warmth they had shared. But slowly life had got in the way, and the letters and photographs became less as years went by. How can life seem so slow, like looking the wrong way through the telescope, and yet so fast, when you flip it around, the past comes zooming back at you and hits you in the eye, as if it were only yesterday. He just didn’t understand.

How easily he had found movement, back then. Now he struggled to get to his feet and needed his water beside his armchair on the wheeled table. How carelessly he had thrown the water from his makeshift bucket, his strong arms effortlessly repeating the action, time and time again.

He lived in the memories inside his head now, the past more real than the present. He spoke to these healthy young people and asked forgiveness for leaving them. When all he had ever wanted to do was to live in the sunshine with them for ever.

Once he had left, the time flew away from him, the days running like they had a hundred legs. A wife and babies had followed, the people in the sunny land but a distant memory, tucked away somewhere in the back of his mind.

The dull rain laden skies above him belonged to his old age, his ‘grown up’ life; that of father, husband, mortgage. That young man was the one whose skin was brown, firm and youthful in that far away land of endless summer.

He was dead now, this strong young man, gone forever. These aging, painful cells that complained at every step had replaced the cells that had made up his youthful body. Lifting the water glass to his lips made his arms shake. That young man had gone for good -replaced by this infirm and used up body.

“Goodbye” he whispered, as he tenderly kissed each photograph, I’ll see you all soon my friends.

His eyes closed, and a shaft of sunlight broke through the grey skies for a moment and kissed him gently, as the pictures slipped from his hand to the floor.