Distant Bridges

When you look at something, it melts a little part of your brain. The image is branded there, not the smells or how the wind felt on your skin, just what you saw. In a different, much deeper part of your mind, the feelings and emotions you felt are filed away in a manner that we don't understand yet scientifically. We don't know how the brain stores joy or awe or horror, whether it's a physical dent in your cortex or a teeny bit of electrical coding in the synapses, but the moment you see a image of what you have seen before you can draw it up and out and remember the way it was. I shouldn't have said smells before because some people have the ability to recreate smells in the same way you or I remember events. They can remember years later just how the pop corn smelt that long ago summer evening at the park.

For me, it's enough that I remember the place and time, the faces and hands of those who were there. What they were saying then about the future, who they wanted to be, what distant bridges would bring into their lives. All the beaches and parks and ballfields we've sat in at dusk and let our hearts speak of what shall be.
The poems written on cardboard boxes, the verses of songs on half a 3x5 card, the moment the right chord for the right refrain was found, the way the lights faded on the pond until it was so dark you only knew who was with you if they spoke.
All this floats to the surface and shines there, this little silver slippery memory, a bluegill, a pond perch emotion, then slips with a splash into the green water.

So many faces in the dark, so many pictures, so many distant bridges crossed and forgotten or lost in the file cabinet of your brain. Are you one of the ones who can remember smells? What is the scent of wonder, what aroma says "Yes" to life. What brings you back?