My favorite memory is always the freshest one—the thing that suddenly floats back into my mind after years of being forgotten. Today it might be those nighttime walks down our street when I was four, my small hand swallowed up in my dad’s. The air was cool and a little damp, the kind that made the hairs on my arms stand up. Under the road, the creek murmured and gurgled, and above it the streetlight buzzed with a faint electrical hum. Thousands of tiny toads, their backs slick and cold-looking, dotted the warm pavement as they snapped at moths swirling in the yellow glow. But I’ve remembered that one before, so it can’t be today’s favorite.
Maybe instead it was around the same time Dad taught me how to catch a rabbit. We turned a wooden box upside down on the grass, the wood rough and splintery under my fingers. One end was propped up with a stick, and from the stick dangled a carrot that smelled grassy and sweet. I remember sitting there in the warm twilight, the chorus of crickets rising around us, imagining the soft thump of a rabbit hopping inside. Only it never happened—we never caught anything—and I’ve remembered that too, so I guess it doesn’t count either.
Maybe it was like the morning after I saw the movie Godzilla. The world outside was wrapped in fog, thick and pale, tasting a little like metal on my tongue. I stood in the garage doorway, breathing the cool mist, and in my mind’s eye—maybe like you’re seeing now—I imagined Godzilla rising up from the creek bed where the toads and the rabbits lived. His huge shape pushing through the fog, headed up the hill. Headed toward me. I’ve remembered that one before, though not too many times, and I don’t know why something so scary—a monster coming through the mist for you—feels like such a good memory to hold onto.
I think it was that same week they took the training wheels off my bike. I was terrified—shaking, crying, the kind of tears that taste salty and hot on your lips. “Momma, no!” I yelled, voice cracking. But when I finally pushed off, the tires hummed on the pavement and suddenly it was easy, smoother than I’d imagined. Wind slapped against my cheeks, drying the last streaks of tears as I flew down the hill toward the creek where the toads chirped. I sailed past the spot where I’d had that bad tricycle wreck the year before. Then I hit the curb, hopped it, shouting and laughing as the bike rattled beneath me, bouncing down the dirt bunny trail. Straight toward Godzilla, or where he would’ve been in the fog.
And I think I had forgotten that. But now I remember, and it’s alright.
Yeah, it’s alright.
Here is the original, from 15 years ago.
https://srevestories.blogspot.com/search?q=tricycle
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