Remembering Things...

I don't claim to have a photographic memory, but I do have a knack for remembering things that have minimal or no importance. For instance, I can remember the contents of each drawer and cabinet in the kitchen of the house I grew up in, down to the minutest detail. I can remember, when I was four, when and where I was the first time I figured out that the blinking red lights on the back of a car indicated which way it was going to turn.

The summer after third grade we took our first big family vacation. We drove from Elmhurst, IL to Colorado and all around the state. One of our stops was the town of Durango. They had this old-time railroad trip you could take through the mountains to Silverton. At the beginning of the trip, as the train was passing people's backyards, I spied a man holding a hose between his legs, watering his garden. He held it like he was pissing. Of course any eight-year-old would find this funny and, mind you, this is well before I saw something similar in "Caddyshack". At the time I made a point of thinking to myself that that sight would be the one thing I would never forget, no matter what. I have no idea why. To this day, anytime I tell myself I can't forget this or that, that image always pops into my head.