California Dreamin’

Things I see or hear during the course of any given day frequently prompt me down a long and winding road in my mind. It could be a song, a smell, or even a taste, and I’m instantaneously catapulted back to the fringed vests of the '60s.  If I hear the Troggs' slurred, seductive lyrics from "Wild Thing" or Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline,” I’m back in the summer of 1968 in the rear seat of my family's white Bonneville, the sun streaming through the car windows as my family makes the cross-country trek to visit the exciting unknowns of California, the epicenter of peace, free love and the home of Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters.

Today, a lazy springtime stroll down Riverside Blvd and a mother chasing after a toddler transports me back 50 years to a comfortable little town outside NYC where I grew up. I saw parents pushing strollers and young children running alongside, intermittently looking up to the faces of their moms and dads for nods of approval if they did a special hop or skip down the crowded sidewalk. I thought about the baby blue shorts set I wore with the little clown in the corner whose hair was made of real strands of red yarn and danced with my every jump.  I loved that outfit so much that I would try to sneak it out of the dirty laundry bag so I could wear it over and over.

The boulevard was warm and pleasant.  A light breeze bursting with the scent of the blossoming flower beds surrounding the equidistant trees lining the sidewalk washed over me, causing me to close my eyes in its sweetness. The playground that was empty yesterday was bustling today. Children were hanging upside down from the monkey bars, jungle gyms, and swing sets, sporting flushed-pink cheeks and matted-down sweaty hair. Their discarded, unneeded layers of clothes from the morning coolness now lay in a heap by the side fence.

I stood and watched for a while, letting my mind travel to my childhood private playground, made out of a maze of bushes on the corner of the street right outside my house. It was basically just a landscaping effort made by the garden complex to add some greenery to an otherwise cement triangle, but to me, it was my very own home where I was the mother.

I picked an opening towards the front wall of bushes to be the front door and, from there, configured my house, complete with children's rooms, a playroom, and a kitchen. Inside those bushes, it was like my own life-sized doll house to play in, which I did for hours on end.

By the time my strolling dropped me back at my front door, I had time-traveled through decades of my life.  Sometimes, these mind journeys sadden me because they shine a light on forever-lost loved ones and lovers, but other times, they fill me with the pure joy of reliving precious moments: coming home from school for lunch and seeing my mother at the front door waiting for me, the smell of her lunchtime delights, her face, her voice, and the feel of her arms around me. Priceless memories that were all mine.

I savor the sweet times stored forever in the archives of my overactive mind.

Meet Randie

It was a trip to Israel that inspired my first novel, "A Different Sky." Learn more here. I’d love to know what inspires you. Let me know here.

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