Summer of 1985
I was “Pajama Dancing,” as I usually do on Saturdays, in between sips of coffee, when this song came on. I am blasted every damn time I hear it… back to the summer of 1985, Camp Sequoia(upstate NY) the counselors shack deck, approximately 11pm, gazing across the deck watching I.H. and Maureen dancing to this song(glued together I need to add), wishing I could will my body to leave or simply disappear into the floor. Half the counselors watched the couple dancing and the other half watched ME, watching the couple dance. As an adult looking back it feels like I am hovering on the ceiling looking down. The ME I was at that time, wondered, “Why Maureen? Why did this happen? Why in front of all these people?” He had broken up with me in a letter, days before he arrived at camp from the U.K. Didn’t our million letters across the sea and two U.S. visits from him mean anything?
Falling in love for the second time(the first was in the 7th grade) at the mature, worldly age of 21 with a man from the U.K.(It was the accent, I swear I couldn’t help myself) seemed like a reasonable and quite mature decision to make. Yet, until I was much older did I realize, it is not a decision one makes, to fall in love, it is something that simply happens to you. So in that moment of watching I.H. dancing with another, my heart was broken, something I wished would cease…the pain. It did over time.
Something my mother said to me when I was 13 and crying over the first broken heart, “there is a lid for every pot M., you will find yours.” “Will there be many lids?” I asked. “For you, I wish many lids and many laughs,” she said.
I am lucky that her wish came true…yet, the song remains part of the bittersweet memory. A way to “time travel” every once in awhile, simply for a visit.
Good night…Sweet dreams XO
