Haircuts and Yellow Jackets

The Old Man got a haircut today. Some time back, I finally woke up to the reality that the '70's were pretty much dead history and moved away from the "blow-dry" look. I had help. Mother Nature gave me a gradual pruning through the years so I now pose very little challenge to barbers. So its back to Vitalis and a hearty fairwell to Consort. The aroma of Vitalis creates a flood of memories. My father (even more follically challenged than me) used a hair tonic called Kreml. I recall it being in a bottle with a long neck and you had to shake it up to get the oil and water to mix enough to squirt some on your head. Its funny how a smell can re-kindle all sorts of memories you'd long since forgotten. The combination of Old Spice, Kreml, and pipe smoke is as real to me today as it was in 1955. A fine man, he. God rest his soul.

As to yellow jackets; there's a nest of them I discovered in my front yard. I'll attack with gasoline at sundown. There, too, lie special memories. When I was about 5 a hired man was working, clearing some brush at our house. I was his chief pester-er and was fully convinced he could do nothing without my assistance. The yellow jackets thought otherwise. As his pick struck the hard Virginia clay, they swarmed out of the ground in a fury. He grabbed me up and ran for the house, swatting bees with his sweaty and beat up old felt hat. I don't recall being stung but the hired man was stung repeatedly. I for the life of me can't remember his name, and that's a shame.

My beautiful daughters talk of Mamma Mia and the fun they had then, and the fun they have now in remembering. Hold on to those memories. One day they'll be even more precious. A smell, a sound, a laugh at some point will be eerily familiar and then you will realize; I remember........