Saturday, October 16, 2010

Refreshing An Indelible Image

In my life there have been events that were continually repeated, events I saw so often that I learned them by heart and they became indelible images in my brain. I begin to notice, as time passes and I grow older, that a light fog sometimes comes between me and the memories. And then I see a photograph and the scene is as fresh as the last time I saw it in real life.

Our house was a house of order and part of that order was this closet in our kitchen next to the back door. As soon as we came in the house, we hung our coats in the closet and put our hats and mittens on the shelf, ready to wear them when we left again. My mother also stored large, lidded metal cans of sugar and flour in this closet, ready to refill her canisters on the kitchen counter. In the fall, there were always bags of Northern Spy apples sitting on the floor of the closet. They stayed cool and fresh there because the unheated closet was against two outside walls. Apples were our after-school snack -- our only after-school snack. So "you won't spoil your dinner," my mother used to say.

This is my father, Lee Doyle, standing in front of the closet getting ready to leave. Dad always wore a hat when he went outside: summer, winter, rain, snow, heat, humidity, he always wore a hat, though not always the same hat. In summer he wore straw or cotton. In winter he wore felt or wool. His work hats were baseball-style caps with a brim on the front. He wore those to work at Copperweld Steel or when he was working at home cleaning gutters, mowing the lawn, or painting the house. Otherwise, his hats were always grey or black fedoras. When he was younger the brims were wider; as he grew older, he chose hats with slightly narrower brims (as in this photo). His hats had no feathers.

He took the jacket or coat out of the closet, put it on, adjusted it, then zipped it. Or if it was a sweater, he buttoned it. When he put on his hat, I remember him adjusting it just so: it didn't perch, neither did it sit too low, but it was low enough and tight enough that the wind didn't blow it off. He took the car keys from on top of the refrigerator (to the left in this photograph) and then out the door to the car or the garage or to walk to the post office he went. I suspect that because it was April when this photo was taken, it was warm enough outside that he didn't need a jacket.

Things we see thousands of times we learn by heart. By heart I remember my father putting on his jacket and hat. What a commonplace thing to remember. What a commonplace thing to photograph! And yet it brings pleasure to clear the fog and refresh my memory of that small action.


This is a Sepia Saturday post. You can find links to others' photos and memories there.

12 comments:

  1. This is a great photo to have of an everyday action. I wish I had some photos like that. Ours seem to be artificially posed. I can imagine you as a little girl watching your father go through his routine.

    ReplyDelete
  2. You know, this is so important. It's the string of 'commonplace' events that bring us to where we are. This is my kind of post. Sometimes we can be distracted by the extraordinary, allowing the everyday recollections drift a little.

    ReplyDelete
  3. It Is One Of The Many Pleasures Of Old Photos, To Evoke Details From Our Past. Isnt it strange to wonder where these memories go without such prompts........
    P.S.You Dad Cuts A Fine Figure Here Nancy!

    ReplyDelete
  4. very nice memory from a photo. i love this kind of post too!

    ReplyDelete
  5. My mother used the phrase "it will spoil your dinner", too. Wonderful post. I remember the men's hats changing with the seasons. I think it is the commonplace which makes our hearts sing loudest.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I love the photos that have the date on them. This is a perfect SS photo. I have no memories or photos of my dad. He left us when I was 8. I do remember he always were a hat though. He was a farmer.
    QMM

    ReplyDelete
  7. My mom too always said 'eating anything will spoil your dinner'...we had an orange tree in our backyard - the kids could eat as many oranges as they wanted - but they were tired of oranges all the time and did without :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. I think most people wouldn't remember to take photos of the everyday things, but they are good reminders which cause the memories to come flooding back. Great photo! I think he your brother looks a lot like him.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Oh how lucky you are to have this photo and the memory of your Dad and his hats and jackets, of the closet and it it held. I am sure you have memories of the smells this closet held too. It is in the ordinary everyday things of our lives that some of the most precious memories are made of. I enjoyed reading of your memories and love the photo of your Dad.

    ReplyDelete
  10. It's wonderful to be able to put this photo in context, but I can tell you if I found it at an antique store I would grab it. Just wonderfully fun image even without context.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Precision? Habit? No matter, emblazoned into memory. Interesting, isn't it?

    ReplyDelete
  12. What a wonderful photo to have of your Father. It's so nice to have such warm memories of your childhood : )

    ReplyDelete

I appreciate your comments and look forward to reading what you have to say. Thanks for stopping by.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...