Daydreaming. Gosh how I miss daydreaming sometimes.
You know, that feeling when you are doing something mundane and you just zone out a little bit and let your mind take you somewhere else?
She found herself in a long forgotten place. One where the towns were sleepy and the people still trusted. They knew their farming neighbours and traded and bartered goods and services.
It was a quaint little place, one where the city traffic was miles and miles off, the silence and solitude made for a beautiful place to rest your soul for a while. Where the trees grew along the roadsides in their silent ways, ever reaching for the elusive sky.
The nights where the cold would seep through the cabins and into the bones of those inside, where thick knitted blankets and home-made quilts lined the beds, where the fire place was lit and excitement roared in the household as the children crept up with their toes toasty while drinking hot chocolate and fighting over marshmallows.
Where the television was not placed in the centre of the room and the outdoors was the best part of every day. The lush green grass swaying in the breeze and sweat wiped from brows as they harvested the season's vegetables from their own land with their own hands, always tasting sweeter and juicier because of the labour of love that went into looking after all the growing things.
Where searching out caterpillars at night in the crops was normal and setting traps for snails was a shared activity between the kids and the ducks. Where the roosters crowed the sleepy town awake each morning and the dawn-break symbolised a new chapter of toil and opportunity alike.
She drifted further down the road of the sleepy town, the little mail boxes lining the road between the farms and the the odd directional signboard enticing her to visit the little places she once knew so well.
A deep longing and hollow sadness caught in her heart and her throat as she once again acknowledged that all those that she knew here once, were long gone in this place. Still remembered and still kept locked up in her heart.
She walked this road for miles, recounting the memories of the gardens she had played in with her friends, the widow-maker trees they had climbed, never once thinking that they might fall. There was no doubt back then, just silly exuberance at the prospect of who could make it up higher, just one more bough. The train track was up ahead, those tracks so perfectly spaced that she and her friends could hold one in each hand and feel the electricity pulse through their arms...where they had once been caught unawares by a freight train. They had panicked, sprang off the tracks and into the brush below. Hearts racing, cheeks flushed. Chattering away afterwards at their near-miss.
She smiled at how simple life seemed back then. When friends would fight and then make up with apologies. When life wasn't pretentious and there was little competition between them. They shared in their sorrows and in their delights. They cried together and made each other laugh so hard that they almost wet their pants.
It seemed long ago now, but those memories only slightly faded. She looked around at the vast difference, the farmland still stood the same as it had, but not tended. The trees much taller now although when she was young, they towered above her as if giant. Had she grown more than they had in the years that followed? She couldn't really tell. Perspective as a child vs an adult.
And then she came to the last plot. It sat there still and empty. She gazed over the porch, where her mother had happily waved and greeted her from, seeing her skipping up the road towards home. Her mother wiped her floured hands on her apron and with a big hug had smiled and told her about the warm cupcakes that had just come out the oven. Her mother's hugs were always the best. They felt like real love, like the warm rays of sun that hit your face and sweeten your cheeks as your smile creeps up. Like the first sip of honeydew in the morning from the well before irrigating the crops. Like the soft feel of fluffy woolen socks on a cold winter's night.
She walked onward seeing the tyre swing still hung from the tree in the back yard, the rope old and weathered now as if almost ready to snap. She was doubtful it would hold her weight now. How many songs she created in that swing while daydreaming on her own...the rush in her stomach as she swung as high as she could, using her legs to pivot her higher and higher. The dreams of being able to swing right up and over the branch.
She found herself laughing at her younger self's silliness and simplicity. The goals of a young girl who knew nothing of the world and who liked to make mudcakes in the farm and dish them up for each family member. Who's dreams at night were so vivid that she could retell them for long whiles in minute detail. Colours, feelings, times, symbols. Subconscious thought intricately woven into threads of strange places and happenings. Of mystery and intrigue, imagination, excitement and hope.
And with that feeling of hope, she swung open the gate and stepped over the threshold of her latest purchase...she was finally home.
All images are my own unless otherwise stated
