Holding a Place, a Time.

If you asked me, I could tell you the exact time and place that the memory snapped into my consciousness. Often, memories are brought back by a sound, a song, or a smell, or even seeing a long-forgotten object. Then the recollection sneaks into your mind and you are gently brought back to an earlier self, with the associated surroundings and events revealing themselves once more.
That was not this memory.

Perhaps it was because it wasn't a sound, nor a smell that worked its magic. It was a song and a sensation. As I said, I could tell you exactly what I was doing, and where I was, but it would mean nothing to you, and it bears no relation to the experience, but it hit so hard that it has imprinted that moment of time on my mind as clearly as the memory itself has done.

Listening to John Mellencamp singing "Ain't That America", was enjoyable, but then I drove around the corner and the sun suddenly burned hard on my right arm, stronger than it should for an Autumn day. The prickling and heat, the sudden warmth of hot air in my nostrils, clear blue sky and a feeling of rushing motion in my head, and SNAP!!, it was there....

"...Ain't that America,
You and me,
Ain't that America,
Land of the free..."

The sudden jolting taste of smoke from the first drag of a Marlboro, with a future of endless possibility running through my head....a sky of Western Queensland hot blue, and a swell of surging optimism building in my chest till I felt I could burst...yet I didn't move.
Just sat, and listened, and savoured this feeling of the invincibility of youth.
We could conquer the impossible, and we would....and nothing could stop us.
All we needed was the chance, the opportunity, the means to go somewhere that would recognise our potential, and give us access to the tools we needed to get the job done so we could turn the world on its' head through our energy and power alone...

And then I drove into shade, into shadows, and the shadows that are my memories fled into the darkness of the trees beside the road.

I like to think they wait in the shade, restlessly. Waiting for the right combination, for the key to fit the lock in my brain so precisely that they can make the jump from the atmosphere back to my consciousness, back to remind me of a time when I was so alive, I knew I could grasp the stars and show them to the World.