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Horsetail Memories
Touchstones of the past
One of the biggest memories of my grandparent’s place on the Oregon coast was the horsetails that grew in the little creek by their home. There was a bridge over the creek and I used to pluck them up and separate the segments when my family gathered there. Unfortunately, the creek sapped the strength of the flooring of the house and when my grandma put a foot through the floor it was time for them to move up into town.
Many years later my sisters and I went by the old place — house was gone (used for firefighting practice) but when we saw it was for sale we toyed with the idea of the family buying it -because you only had to walk up the driveway and onto the other side and you were on the beach. But none of us had the bucks to do it.
By the time I turned eleven both my grandparents had passed, but every time I see a horsetail, I think of them and the good times we shared. We often encounter ordinary objects that are imbued with fond memories. In the house I grew up in we could look out the kitchen window at a grape arbor. There were two types of grapes, and one was Concord. They were small and luscious, and the arbor was packed with them.
