i walked around the old farm where i had lived. it had been turned into a bed'n'breakfast, so at least i could pay to visit it. the old man who had come to possess it after we left years and years ago was odd but warm and welcoming. as he showed me my old bedroom i recounted to him the first memory that sprang to mind. i told him how i remembered a proud and insane bird who used to bang irascibly against my window first thing in the morning, disturbed by its own image. strange that my slumber should be interrupted by this animal's reflected delusion. the man said with a smile that the very same thing still happened to him now. i couldn't believe it.
as i set out on my walk the man related how he had been overcome by emotion when he had visited places from his past. i discounted his warning, inured as i thought i was to overwhelming feelings of that nature. away from the farmhouse the memories came back, slowly at first. the bend in a river, the quicksand in the marsh, the smell of a hollow log. as i climbed the hill i wondered what the view would be like. when i reached the top and turned around the first thing that struck me was that i could see much further than i remembered was possible. as i looked over the distant terrain, the neat, pine covered hills nudged by the gathering rain clouds, i was suddenly overcome by the emotion the old man had warned me of. as i collapsed in a teary heap i thought of all i had lost, all i had missed and all i had not felt in those twenty something years since i had lived here. i thought of my sick mother. and i thought of the girl i should have had by my side. she would have been surprised at my tears. some of them were for her.
it was the most beautiful thing i can remember seeing. in my manic state i was careful to make sure i was out of sight of the farmhouse although i'm sure the man would have understood...
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