I posed this question to a friend of mine recently: "Looking back on your life, name some of the high points and tell me why you remember them?"
Maybe it's the change of season, or maybe it's birthdays, or maybe it's just because all of the hate ads are gone from the TV and peace has been restored that puts me in this mood. But actually, the Christmas ads have started already and that's a whole new ball of wax, but we will save that for a future column.
High points, or keepers as I call them, can happen at anytime; sometimes they are planned like vacations or special occasions, and other times they are spontaneous moments that remain in your heart forever, like souvenirs.
Career high points is a category unto itself. Your first job, I mean your first real job where your paycheck came every two weeks and it covered the rent. Maybe during that job you landed a big client, brought sales up 45 percent or produced the best radio commercial the company had ever heard. Whatever career highlights you have, they usually left you with a great feeling of pride, accomplishment and happiness.
Personal high points in life are definitely in a category of their own and vary greatly among everyone. Time with the people we have loved, family reunions, birthday parties all carry souvenirs for us. I still have a birthday card my brother gave me for my 12th birthday with a 1972 quarter taped to the inside. Simple pleasures are the best. Sure, I suppose the rich have very different keepers than the rest of us. Do you think a trip to Carlsbad Caverns would be a keeper for Mick Jagger?
Souvenirs seem to involve travel or special people, or both. When I was in college, my boyfriend and I sneaked off to Niagara Falls for a weekend. My father found out about it afterward and was convinced we eloped. It took me months to convince him I was still single. The drive up, the raincoats we wore on the Maid of the Mist boat, the little cabin we stayed in, all keepers.
My great-grandmother was a quiet, unassuming woman from southeastern Ohio with little money. I never knew my great-grandfather; he died before I was born. They lived in the same small house their entire lives, raised their children in it, and it was where I would go back to visit her into my early 20s. My dad would tell me the story of the trip they would take for their anniversary every year, which must have been in the 1940s and 1950s. It was the highlight of the year for them, driving from Ohio to Virginia in the fall to see the colors changing in the trees along Skyline Drive. When I first heard this story, I didn't understand how something as simple as that was so memorable to them. Now that I am older, I get it. Keepers.
As we get older, the keepers, the souvenirs, become more and more special. I guess that saying might be true, that you know you are old when all you talk about are your memories. I'm not quite there yet, but I feel it coming.
The aspens in the Jemez are at their peak color this weekend. Get your loved ones and drive up for the day. Take a good long look out your car window. I promise the yellow leaves against the blue November sky above and the red rocks below will stay with you forever.
Quote of the Week: "Memories, they can't be boughten. They can't be won at carnivals for free. Well it took me years to get those souvenirs. And I don't know how they slipped away from me." — "Souvenirs" by Steve Goodman.
2010 Copyright Jennifer Huard. All Rights Reserved.
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