Yesterdays

Memories are like small frozen nuggets, preserved in an ice cube tray ready to pop out and thaw when needed.

I suppose we all have time zones in our lives. Mine falls into three categories; before him, with him and after him. I didn’t plan it that way. It just seemed to happen.

Life changes dramatically when a loved one departs. Not always in the way expected or anticipated, but in small mundane ways that are difficult to navigate.

That’s how I felt about Saturday mornings. It had always been the busiest and nicest day of the week for us. After the children had grown and left, we were able to linger over croissants and coffee, and leisurely catch up on what had occurred during our week. He was traveling a lot, and the errands we shared were done together later in the afternoon.

I never realized how greatly I valued that special day of the week until a September morning seven years ago when it quietly ended.

Weeks later without being aware of why I did it, I began to listen to opera on Pandora as I lingered over a second cup of coffee. The music seemed to soothe, and a new routine began for me as the years passed, sometimes slowly; sometimes not quite so. I have been able to comfortably navigate Fridays and Sundays, but I needed the magic carpet of music to help me on Saturdays.

This week as I poured the second cup of dark bold black Columbian and the glory of Maria Callas’ voice flowed through the kitchen, I finally realized exactly what I have been recreating.

An ice cube of memory had thawed, and if I closed my eyes I was back in the large tenement kitchen on the fourth floor of 450 West 58th Street sitting at the wooden table with Ellen listening to music floating across the yard from Addison Hall on 57th Street.

Tenements were built back to back with buildings on the neighboring street. Most of the kitchens faced identical buildings; ours didn’t. We were across from a structure that housed many of the major voice teachers in NYC. Of course, we didn’t know it. We only heard the music and learned to love it. During the summer months without air conditioning, the windows were always open, and I suppose that was also when many of the vocal students had their lessons. Both our parents worked on Saturday morning, and my sister and I would sit at the oval table listening as the concerts began. We never knew whose voice we heard or the name of any of the arias, but the music became as much a part of our lives as fish on Friday.

That happened a lifetime ago, and apparently, I needed to reach back in time for a comfort zone when another cherished period of my life abruptly ended.

The music conjures the zone “before him,” the earlier years when I was still a child, but totally insulated with love, security and family. That is what I have been unknowingly reaching for these many lonely Saturday mornings; memories of others who held my hand, brushed away my tears and fears, cared for me, and then also moved on. The hidden reminiscences of those long ago Saturday mornings remind me that even as time passes and loved ones depart, the gift of love once given, really never does. And life does go on.