We all have reminders of our past. They can be pictures, small mementos, keepsakes and trinkets. In my case, I have bricks. I mean I have photos and mementos and all that stuff too, but I have a collection of bricks culled from different places over the last 30 years or so.
I have a few bricks from my home in Brookfield, the house I grew up in as a kid.
I have pavers from in front of my Grandma's house in LaGrange. During street construction and hidden under layers of aged concrete and blacktop were these beautiful huge Purington pavers! They are a time machine, a glimpse of the past when all the streets in the America were paved with bricks.
Of course Purington pavers were manufactured in East Galesburg, just a few miles away from where Tracy and I lived for a few years. So we have some pavers from our Galesburg home as well in our collection of bricks.
I have some bricks from our reworked chimney, one from an old brick sidewalk behind our house, and others that found their way into our collection.
A few are a bit burnt, as they were blown into the back of our store in Galesburg during the O.T. Johnson fire.
We have used these bricks outside in different ways over the years, and now we are using them as a meandering border for a shade garden along the east property line in our yard.
None of the bricks are perfect. Most are chipped or worn, pieces are missing, discolored. They are in a way a metaphor for life. Somehow we make our lives work even though it isn't always perfect, isn't always the way you want it to be.
As I was down on my knees yesterday, scooping out dirt and setting the brick border, a lot of nice memories from the past came flooding through. It was fun reminicing about the past while setting a border, litterally brick by brick, in my backyard.
I am only about a third of the way done. If it would just stop raining for more than a few days in a row, I could get it finished! :)
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