Remember That Time?

Whenever two or more of my siblings are together, there is always a visit from the Remember Whens with a recap of some event in our life together.  Not unusual, I think, for most families.  Our history is the common thread that binds us together.  What always amazes me, however, is how different our recollections of the same event can be.

Yesterday, I was in my kitchen (where all the best conversations happen) with my mother, sister and brother, when the Remember Whens popped up in the usual way:  a discussion of a current happening led to a memory of a past event.  This was a major event for our family, an accident that was traumatic for the victim, obviously huge for our mother, and big enough to have ripple effects throughout the home.  My mother remembered where she was and what she was doing when the call came.  My brother was present during the accident (something I never knew before), my sister had her own memories of the conversations and happenings, and I – being the youngest and quite little at the time – remembered only the sudden whirl of activity and being given Pringles chips (a very new snack option then) by the neighbor lady who was there to take care of us while the grownups were at the hospital.

How is it possible that 9 people, raised under the same roof, with the same influences can have 9 different versions of the same event?  But that’s usually how it happens.  Not always drastic differences, but it highlights the unique perspectives that we human beings have.  The way we view the world around us is defined by our states of mind and our priorities.

In a situation like that, a mother has to take care of business.  So those are the details that she remembers.  A person more involved in the moment will have a much more personal view and a young child who knows nothing but safety and love will notice that something was slightly different, but still there was safety and love. 

On a later topic – the layout of a house – my sister recalled the exact floorplan.  My brother remembered specific rooms.  I remembered a ceramic worm or caterpillar or some sort of creature that sat on the back of the toilet in the half bath.  I guess that was at the right height for my little kid eyes to become etched in my mind as an important part of the scenery

When I think about these differences in perspective, one example always comes to mind.  Life at the El Dorado Motor Lodge.  I have not interviewed all of my family members on the subject, but I would bet that we took VERY different memories away from that experience.

In the spring of 1975, our family took a big leap, left our hometown and headed east to Baltimore.  We thought we’d be moving in to a cool new house and were excited for the adventure.  In addition to our own nine kids, we also had a couple of extra teenage boys in the mix.  Imagine the surprise when we arrived in Maryland only to learn that unexpected glitches in the mortgage process meant we could not move in to our new home!

Fortunately, my mother’s brother – the man who encouraged us to come east in the first place – was in nearby Hagerstown.  He was a restaurant owner with a lot of contacts and he arranged for us to take shelter at the El Dorado Motor Lodge.  The closed, vacant, and basically abandoned El Dorado Motor Lodge.

The motel hadn’t been occupied for some time.  Not all of the rooms were functional.  The plumbing barely worked and there was no hot water.  But there was a roof and there were beds and we settled in.  We cooked on a Coleman camper stove, a hotplate and an electric popcorn popper.  We washed dishes in the bathtub and then scooped the old water into the toilets to flush them.  There was a caretaker who lived in a house on property and we helped where we could with whatever menial tasks needed to be done. 

Every morning, my mother drove us the 75 miles in to Baltimore to go to school where were already enrolled.  I have no idea what she did while we were there, but then she picked us up and took us back to do it all over again.  We did this for something like 8 weeks, but I’m not entirely sure how long we were actually there.

Now, from my adult outlook, I don’t know how my mother did it.  How she held it together.  She not only had her own shock and disappointment to deal with but she had a bunch of surly teenagers to battle.  She had younger kids who needed baths and meals and clean clothes.  And she did it.  She did it well.  Maybe she went off into the woods at night and screamed and howled at the moon, but if that’s what happened, I never saw it.

From my kid point of view, it was a blast!  We had the run of this place, with keys to empty rooms to explore.  It was one giant escapade, like camping but with real beds and fewer insects.  We jumped on furniture and played hide and seek.  We crossed the highway to an arcade to play pinball and air hockey.  My brothers snuck me in to the movie theater (they were good at that) to see Jaws!  Somehow, some way, this time in my life has existed in my memories as an interesting, fun, positive and adventurous thing.

That’s my take on it.  It was a classic lemonade from lemons story where we learned that if our family worked together and just loved each other, we could do anything! And on more practical matters, we scored a ton of free furniture and I wouldn’t be surprised if a few pieces survive within family walls today.  I doubt the older kids view it with such affection, but there was nothing negative in it for me.

I credit my mother with never letting us see her sweat so that I could choose the rose colored glasses for myself.  If she had been melting down, I doubt I’d have such fond thoughts of those days.  That’s something I hang on to with my own children when faced with challenges that could be overwhelming.  I hope that when they look back, they’ll remember the celebrations and the adventures and not the obstacles and hardships.

And isn’t that really the lesson for all of us?  We may not always write the stories ourselves, but we choose our own angles to those stories.  Whatever the adversity, we may not be able to choose the outcome or choose the details, but we definitely choose the way we view it.

As the bumper sticker says, shit happens.  It happens to all of us.  So are we going to lament and cry or are we going to face it down, deal with it, and tell hilarious stories about it later?  The choice really is ours alone to make.  I will always choose the hilarity over the woe.