Untold Tales by a Whimsical Wallflower

I have one memory set back in the days when I was maybe five or six. My whole family was in the car, bored with the tedious driving as we ventured the eight hour journey to my grandparents’ house. To pass the time, my dad stuck in a tape (we didn’t have CD players at that time) of oldies. He liked to sing oldies to pass the time and keep himself awake. He still does that to this day. There was this one oldie called “Kiss Me Goodbye.” I remember driving directly under a bridge as soon as the song reached its exciting part. It went “And kiss me goodbye, and I’ll try not to cry.” And as soon as we drove out from under that bridge, I just looked out the windows at the endless golden fields. I suddenly realized that we were actually driving in the middle of those fields. Rows and rows of planted crops, all lined up perfectly with each other. We passed them so fast that I got dizzy looking at them blur away. It was such a rushing feeling to hear that song on Highway 5. Such a peak of emotion in the most boring place in California!

Recently, my family went to visit my grandparents again, and that same song came up on my dad’s CD. But I didn’t experience the same rush of feeling. I just remembered back to when I was six and sighed. This time, the echoes of the song told me that childhood had kissed me goodbye. But the memory lives on.