I’m amazed at how our senses can take us back to another time and another place…

The taste of a delicious, hot Southern biscuit reminds me of my Mama’s wonderful cooking. One bite of homemade banana pudding with the golden brown meringue, I close my eyes…forty six years pass…and I’m home again.

If I get even a slight whiff of the perfume “Windsong” by Prince Matchabelli or of the men’s cologne, “English Leather”, it’s 1966 all over again and I’m a young newlywed.

If I hear the song “Aldi-La”, it’s 1964 and I’m sitting in the coffee shop at Mississippi College (I think it was called “The Wigwam”) with my roommate, Linda, who had just broken up with her boyfriend and we are both in tears. If the old movie “A Man Called Peter” is playing on the classic movie channel, I think of a Saturday night in 1963 and a young man named Ross.

Sometimes our senses can even play tricks on us. Not long after my father passed away, I was shopping at the grocery store and saw an elderly gentleman who looked so much like my father, even down to the slight parkinsons tremor and the gait. I found myself closely following him for two or three aisles in the grocery store…it was almost like looking at my Daddy all over again. I managed to pull myself together long enough to park the shopping cart and left the store in tears.

Touch. What can I say? I’m a hugger. I come from a long line of huggers. The human spirit can only go so long without being touched…held…hugged. There have been dozens of studies on how many hugs a day a human needs. As a Registered Nurse, I spent many years taking care of patients and made sure I incorporated some form of touch besides the routine care…a pat on the back or arm…a reassuring hug. Perhaps this is also why the studies have attributed having a pet to a sense of well-being and an overall decrease in blood pressure.

Have you ever noticed how much we learn from our sense of touch? How many times have we seen something that we’d never seen before and our first response is to want to touch it. Ever notice the sign “Do Not Touch” in a museaum or exhibit?

I walk into a fabric store and my senses are overwhelmed with row after row of bolts of fabric…all different colors…patterns…textures. I’m also overwhelmed with memories of spending time growing up in the fabric store with my Mama. She was an excellent seamstress and made most of my clothes. We’d spend time together selecting a new pattern and find the fabric for it together. I did the same thing with my children…and, now, my daughter with hers. Mama had so many offers to sew for payment, but she reserved those talents for her family. She told me:  “I only sew for love”.  Years later, after I began the tedious work of sewing for my family, I understood and said the same thing to my family. Who knew that would come full circle as now I hear my daughter repeat the exact declaration as she works hard to sew for her family…

Originally published in My Southern Heart.  

I’m headed to the fabric store this morning for a super sale on patterns and it brought back memories of this past post.  Thought I’d share…