Memories in Melancholia
The sky is overcast. I feel chilled, even though it is supposed to be warm. I’m sitting in the room next to our bedroom, which is my work room, my art room, the room where I watch television. Outside the window the dogwood tree blocks everything with its abundant foliage and its delicate ivory blossoms. Two little birds are busy flitting in and out through its foliage. Are they feeding their young? From the bedroom, classical music drifts through.
I am feeling very melancholy. The spirits of the ones I have loved and lost are crowding around me. They seem to nudge each other to remind me of times long gone by. They whirl around me faster and faster. ‘’Do you remember? Do you remember?’’ they ask me anxiously. Of course I remember, but I cannot relish my memories in this manner I would like to lovingly cherish and delight in each one individually. I want to tenderly hold them close to my heart and relish each memory as one does sipping a glass of fine wine or beluga caviar as it deliciously slides down from your tongue down your throat. I would like to close my eyes and picture them slowly, moment by moment, those times gone by.
I close my eyes and drift back to the time I was a five-year-old little girl. It is summer. I am playing in our garden. The flowers sway to the tunes of the warbling birds. Butterflies flit from one flower to the next, taking delicate sips of the nectar that is offered to them. I am dressed in a starched pastel dress with smocking on the chest and a Peter Pan collar, like all little girls dressed then. With a salt shaker firmly clutched in my little hand, I run around the garden. My father had told me that if I was able to sprinkle salt on the tail of a bird, the bird would become my pet and my friend. For the past few days, I have been trying diligently to do just that, sprinkle salt on a bird’s tail. My attempts have been futile. The birds flew away each time I approached them!
I open my eyes and close them again. This time I am about eight or nine years old. We now lived in a spacious apartment on Khiaban Shah Reza. Papa and I are sitting at the dining table. It is evening and I am fatigued. We have been sitting there for a very long time. Papa has been trying to teach me the multiplications table. At that point, I was not concentrating on the sums, I was desperately yearning for my bed. Finally, my father took pity on me. I was already dressed for bed. I had washed and brushed my hair and my teeth. I was in my nightgown. Released at last, I scampered into my bed. I remember feeling as if I had sunk into a soft cloud that gently carried me into a deep blissful sleep.
My mind wandered once more. This time, I had frittered away my Christmas holidays. I was having such a wonderful time! Between family gatherings and parties, I did not even think of my homework, despite my mother’s warnings. We were to study for a test that we were to have, the day after the Christmas holidays. Foolish little girl that I was, I tucked the book under my pillow and hoped to glean the information through osmosis. That night I felt as if I had sat on top of dark clouds in my dreams. There were loud claps of thunder and strong winds shrieking in rage. I was jolted hither and thither like one marooned in a stormy and angry sea. All night long I was jolted back and forth. Finally, in the early hours of the morning, I was thrust rudely out of my bed. I sat up. I rubbed my eyes. My heart was thumping hard, my breath was coming in painful gasps, I was drained with worry and fear! I knew that I would have to pay the consequences for my negligence. I knew I would fail that test, and I most definitely did!
My father liked to consider himself to be stern. He really was not. Sometimes, when he was relaxed and happy, he would sing a little song that he had made up. It was very simple. It went like this:
I love you Mama
I love you Stella
I love you Nora
I love you Gilda
I love you Jacky
I love you all so much
Yes, I love you all so very much.
That was the basic song. As time went by, he added his grandchildren.
Years have passed by. They are all gone now. The other day Kelly came home very frustrated and upset about something. There was nothing I could say or do that would comfort him. Instead, I began to hum the tune, then I added my own words of love.
I love you Papa
I love you Mama
I love you Peter
I love you Kelly
I love you Jessica
I love you my Teal
I love you Matthew
I love you all so much
Oh how very much I love you
My darling precious family…
A little smile curled upon his lips. Kelly became calm. Papa’s song of love worked. It always did. It was our family lullaby. It was our declaration of our love for each other. I wish I could add the tune to the words, but I don’t know if that is possible.
I pause from writing and raise my eyes to the window looking out to the garden. Twilight fast approaches! The flowers on the dogwood seem to shimmer and glow in a pale polished ivory. It is Bach’s birthday today. On the radio, his music floats in from the other room. The sky gets dimmer and dimmer. The occasional raindrop timidly hits the roof.
I return to my persistent ghosts. My Aunty Marcelle gently tugs at me. She wants to borrow me from her sister, just as I used to borrow Renata from mine. Aunty takes me to her home for a week during the summer holidays. She delights in me as I delight in her. She teaches me how to make the perfect mayonnaise and the rhum baba, which I never succeed in mastering. She makes me the most exquisite dresses. She avidly copies creations from the heavy tome of L’Officielle, the French bible of every well-dressed lady worth her salt. She receives it quarterly. It weighs a ton. When it arrives she sets it on her dining table. She prepares herself a demi tasse of Turkish coffee, scented with cardamom pods. She takes a tiny sip then concentrates on the catalog of haute couture. She goes through it eagerly. Which one of these styles will she recreate? She is an accomplished seamstress of exotic clothes. She had closets full of the most desirable fabrics. She always dressed so very elegantly, always the creations are a product of her own busy fingers. She and Mama had the thickest of French accents. Everyone thought them to be French. With Aunty copying the designs of the French designers, it was taken for granted that they were. They were not.
So many memories. So many beautiful memories. I cannot put a lifetime of memories in this one essay.
My mind speeds to the time when Peter and I met. Ah! When we met, we must have been struck by a thunderbolt. Neither one of us had any intention of getting married again. We had both gone through long and messy divorces. I had promised myself that I would never get married again. I should have saved my breath on that promise, for I promptly broke it the minute I set eyes on him. Peter believed that it was God’s plan that we should be together. I think that must be true, for we had the happiest and most loving of marriages. We found our soulmates in each other, and our lives together were so very special. Mama adored him. She warned me if I ever broke up with him, not to come running to her for comfort. She need not have worried about that. We had no intention of separating. Peter used to say our spirits were born together, his in Brooklyn, mine in Baghdad. He often said that we would die together at the age of eighty-seven, at which time he would accidentally drive his sports car into a tree. I believed him. But that was not what happened. No, he left without me! ‘’He abandoned me,’’ I sobbed as my brother held me close. He pulled me away from him. There was a look of concern on his face. ‘’Stella, he did not abandon you. He died.’’ My brother is right. He did not abandon me. His precious life was suddenly, cruelly, and without warning snatched away, but he did not take me with him. He left me behind.
The sky has darkened. Some of my ghosts are calmer now. They are not feeling agitated anymore. They are all dear to me. I cherish them. I am done for now. It is time l return to the present, but I am reluctant to let go of my memories.
I hum Papa’s song. ‘How very much I love you My very precious family,’ I croon softly to myself.
The classical music that drifts from the next room soothes me. Outside my window, it is pitch dark. It is late. I rise from my chair. It is time to get ready to go to bed…