tis funny the tiny, intrinsic things that ignite a forgotten moment, unlocking a forlonged memory.  like how just now savouring on a piece of banana and walnut bread, staring blankly for a train to rescue me from suburbia, i can taste the creamy banana loaf that grandma used to make.  the melting walnut suddenly tastes like the brown sugar bliss that oozed from her buttertarts upon first bite.  or the tartness of my other grandmother’s pink applesauce.  my treat gone, memories warm and moist, i’m left with a palpable explosion of delicious nostalgic.

on the train now.

digesting the sweetness of my grandmothers my thoughts drift to my mother.  she knows how to make every (life) recipe from scratch.  she taught me that simple common sense is in fact wise wisdom.

just the other night i had a little girl tantrum — the kind where only the soothing voice of your maternal elder can transform calamity into calmness.  so i called my mom.  16 hours behind me, she wakes to my ranting philosophy of bittersweet surrealism — the emotion of leaving one place for the next, heartbroken to leave here, elated to go there.

such a patient lass that mom is.

she listens tentatively and silently, my coach for 31 years, letting me talk aloof.  when i can no longer find my words she says, “take a deep breath dear.”

and breath i did.  just like that, i was feeling better.

they say that anxiety builds up in a person because she isn’t breathing deeply enough.

it turns out, i live fast, i live fully but i just don’t breathe (deep).  i jump in deep.  i can swim.  i just don’t take in the fresh air.

i can raise a million dollars for a community project.  i’m a gentle console to others.  i can plan the logistics for any event except for my own affairs (or so it appears).

an empty pack on my back i trek the world without a plan just fine but whilst packing up boxes to move across said world, i’m a fucking mess.

my mom tells me that my artwork will be easier to send if i take the pieces out of their frames and roll them up in a tube.  of course it will.  see common sense made wise.

all of this funny to a girl who just advised someone on how to raise $5 million.  the same girl who yesterday listened to a friend trying to find her own strength.  the same lady who writes to others but so very often reads her own words.

my logic is on one end of the spectrum, my emotion on the other — and my common sense … lingering somewhere in between.

train stops.

my stomach rumbles.  my hippocampus is hankering for a buttertart.

and a side of pink applesauce please.