What’s in a Name

 

Organizing paperwork today and, in the spirit of ecology was using old file folders.  Grabbing the white out strips to cover up the writing on old folders gave me pause for reflection and contemplation.

The majority of folders were used when George and I had our own business, Heritage Printers.  Back in 2003, fearing a layoff looming on his horizon, George met some people from Press-A-Print.  Press-A-Print offered sales and training for equipment to do an in-home business for promotional products.  You know, the chachki’s used to spread your business name around to get people to buy your products.  Intrigued, and a creative designer by trade, George expressed interest in doing this side business.  He figured in the event he got laid off this would be a great way to supplement unemployment. 

The first thing we had to do was come up with a business name.  After some back and forth we decided upon Heritage Printers.  The background of that name was that Benjamin Franklin invented the printing press and since we were going to do printing (though of a different nature), it was in our U.S. Heritage.  He even designed a logo that incorporated Benjamin Franklin into it.

We set up shop at our home and business trickled in.  About two or three years in we had managed to get a number of jobs.  And the folders I encountered today included some of those business names.  As I spread white out across the folders I remembered some of the jobs we had done for these business.  Lot of business cards.  Probably our biggest job and a repeat job was for Cal State Stanislaus where the daughter of one of our friends was a key contact.  I remembered some of the crazy things they had us make from throw blankets to beach balls, glow sticks and tshirts. 

George never did get laid off which left doing most of the business ventures to me.  I was not as confident about doing the actual pad printing on my own as the science behind it and the fear of making a mistake loomed large.  With George working full time we eventually did what many people in our situation did, we ordered wholesale.  Less work and a whole lot more fun! 

Today’s names that came up were some of the women’s businesses in the group I had joined, churches we did work for, strangers wanting something for an event.  Each white out erased the name of a company or a person for whom we had made connections. 

We closed that business in 2012 as the .com industry had suffered and not many people had budgets for the products.  By the time we were done, we were pretty much doing mostly business cards which was not a money maker at all. 

Though sad in some respects, I was also relieved to not have this business anymore.  Here it is, some eight years later, and I am just now re-using folders from that business.  (It didn’t help that George insisted we keep the files but which I think I finally got rid of or just kept some very basic things in case of taxes.) 

Our brains are much the same.  We have information in file folders in our memory.  For a time we can retrieve much of what is stored there.  As time goes on, the need to retain so much information goes away.  In some cases it is a sign of aging.  For me, my memory has never been that great anyway.  However, sometimes a word, a name, a place will flit across that memory bank and I can see and hear people, conversations and places as if it were just yesterday. 

I love these sorts of memories, bittersweet though some may be.  They tell a story, MY story.  Each name that I remember is an intrinsic part of me, whether or not I remember the details.  I can choose to open the file or leave it tucked away.  It will always be there. 

 

 

Inch Worm - Music that carries us back in time

 

INCH WORM

Written by Frank Loesser in 1952
Sung by Danny Kaye in Hans Christian Anderson

 

Inch worm, inch worm
Measuring the marigolds
Could it be, stop and see
How beautiful they are

[Chorus:]
Two and two are four
Four and four are eight
Eight and eight are sixteen
Sixteen and sixteen are thirty-two

Inchworm, inchworm
Measuring the marigolds
You and your arithmetic
You'll probably go far

[Repeat Chorus]

Inchworm, inchworm
Measuring the marigolds
Seems to me you'd stop and see
How beautiful they are

 

I listen to this song and I am transported back to my childhood.  I can envision an LP album (that would be a 33RPM one, the large ones) in my parents living room, a picture of Danny Kaye perhaps on the front of the album. I can picture my mom singing along with the tune.  I can picture the movie with Danny Kaye singing the song to a bunch of children – and to a little inchworm on a leaf. 

Music feeds the souls and feeds our memories.  Like a time space capsule, we are taken back to various times in our lives, remember ourselves as a young child, perhaps.  Or remembering a parent, a friend, a movie, a place.  It is as though we are watching a movie that took place years ago, with ourselves as one of the characters.  We are IN the movie yet we are watching the movie from our present life.  Disconnected yet connected at the same time. 

There are other songs I can remember.  Some make me smile, some make me weep.  All are precious to me. 

Here are some that I can recall at the moment:

Any of the songs from the Sound of Music, Mary Poppins. 
Grow Old Along With Me
With You (from the musical Pippin)
There is Love – by Paul Stookey
Both Sides Now (Carly Simon)
Barry Manilow Songs
The Piano Guys music
Campfire Songs from Girl Scout days

My list would go on and on.  The playlist on my phone has many of the old songs I love and hold dear. 

What does your playlist look like? 

 

A Sense of Normalcy

 

As I was driving to San Jose for a visit on Saturday, August 8, 2020, it occurred to me that this was a date I should remember.  I thought on it and realized it was six years ago on this date when George and I experienced our last “normal” day together.  The next day, August 9, is the day our lives would turn upside down with a cancer diagnosis . . . and we would never experience this type of normal again.

I tried to remember back to that day.  It was a Friday, so I would have been off work.  It is likely that I was using the day to run errands, do things around the house as that is what I would have done on a “normal” Friday.  I had that day to myself as Mom would have been at SarahCare for the day.  George would have been at work for at least a half day, finishing up his hours for the week.  When he returned home from work, he was likely in the garage or his office making up the list of wood he needed from Southern Lumber.  The wood he would need to start building a double Adirondack chair for our backyard.  The next day we had plans to go to Southern Lumber to purchase the wood so he could build it.  But, honestly, I cannot remember what I did that day.  It was just another day, another normal day.  The kind that we don’t need to remember.  The kind of day when nothing significant happens so we just lump it together with all the other normal days.

There are many thousands of days that I don’t remember throughout my life.  Sometimes when I talk to people I grew up with or went to school with, they will recall certain details, maybe even vividly, of things that happened.  I oft wonder where on earth I was that I have absolutely no idea what they are talking about.  I do not remember any such thing.  I’ve told myself it’s because whatever was going on was just another typical, normal day.  And most of us recall things based on something that stands out, that was so different that we think we’ll never forget it.  Some of us do remember, others of us do not.  Our brains are so tricky here. 

So, when trying to recollect what happened on Friday, August 8, 2014, it is no surprise that I don’t remember the events of the day.

On Saturday, August 9, 2014, I can remember almost every single detail.  We had opportunity to remember that day hundreds of times in the past five or six years as it is the day that changed our lives, changed our “normal” into something we never, ever would have expected to happen to us. 

I wish we could have had more “normal” years together.  As I watch other older couples walk hand in hand, I yearn for that feeling, for that comfort.  Holding hands was normal for us.  It gave us both a feeling of comfort and security.  Our “grow old along with me” type of comfort that we thought we would have for decades.  Taking walks, going on trips, all the things of a normal marriage shattered, a “new normal” that would wax and wane and take different shapes for the next five years.  Constantly adapting to the changes going on in George’s body required that we not get used to anything to be consistently normal ever again. 

In my new home, I haven’t yet found my new normal.  With a global pandemic causing our whole world to make changes, there is nothing normal taking place and there won’t be for quite some time.  I miss normal.  I want normal. Because normal is a predictable, unwavering process (not that there aren’t glitches) that allow us to be at peace, to enjoy a predictable pace of life and activity.  I do not know what normal will look like for me – or how long it will take to find it.  Soon, I hope.  Soon.