Flourescent Memories (Prose Poem)

It has been far too long since I have seen her. She walks off the plane with her hair in her typical tightly wound blonde bun. The fluorescent lights in the terminal accentuate the fluorescence of the bleach that penetrates to her roots. Her gentle face, although wrinkled and aged, has the essence of a ten-year-old girl: so innocent and sweet. She can’t hear very well, but you get used to hearing “WHAT?” every three minutes. Like a comforting blanket, her presence has warmed the energy of our family; she has created a bridge between our stress and sanity.

As we sit at the dinner table, I remember how she took care of me like her own while my mother was at work. Making Barbie Dolls come to life and playing the pigpen game; I looked forward to it every rainy afternoon. Whenever she bought me a toy, I would frantically open it up, put my shiny new friend off to the side, and climb inside the box to transport myself to a new world. She encouraged my wild imagination. I always knew that after dinner, she would open a cabinet below the oven and take out a glossy blue tin that contained the most delicious cookies in the entire world. The crystallized sugar that sat atop the buttery soft surface was like nothing I have tasted before. I was only allowed to pick one out of the little white doilies that they lived in, but I always knew that the next day I would get to choose another. In the summer I would throw on my favorite pink polka-dotted bathing suite, slide on my swimmies and jump in her pool. She laughed how I always knew not to pass the patio without my swimmies. When my skin burned from the sun, I would wander around the shady parts of the grass, along the fence, and collect the swirly snails that stuck to the sides. We would put them in a small box, with holes to breathe, and save them to show mommy what I had found.

She was my playmate, and I appreciated her. Most of my childhood memories include her, and now that she is back, I feel like I am still sitting on that bright green carpet playing the “oink oink game.” Even when she returns back to the west, I know that I will still be able to see the reflection of her bright blonde bun, wound just as tight as when I was three.