Sail On Silver Girl

Sail On Silver Girl

I wish I would have written down the day or the date or even the time. I do that sometimes. When I am writing I forgot to write that down. Then when I go back and fine tune and add or subtract, otherwise known as editing, I always wish I would have. I sit there and look at the page and look at the words and try to go back to that day, to that place, to those emotions. I try to remember what was going on that day, what made me feel that way or what helped me write the words. What emotions put the words to the page? 

Sometimes I know when I am in a certain mood that something happened. Usually something not good. I think this writing was on that day. The day I was agitated. The day I was annoyed. The day I felt off. Last Tuesday. I found out a few days later that my great aunt had passed away. Her name was Verna. She was an interesting character for sure. 

For my writing practice that day, I wrote the below. I can’t explain why. I can’t explain what. I just wrote. I just wrote free. I didn’t think, I didn’t contemplate, I just wrote. I didn’t want to feel or think or look. I just wrote. 

Sail On Silver Girl

This song, Bridge Over Troubled Water is playing and I am crying. Why? No idea. something about this song is stirring emotions. I don’t know what emotions—childhood emotions, kid emotions, wanting someone to help emotions. I can’t place it. I can’t pinpoint it. This song is so familiar. We listened to Simon and Garfunkel all the time at the Prospect house, maybe even the Euclid house. Music is so stress relieving and so life re-living. The song is so lyrically emotional—needing, wanting someone to help. Someone to help you feel loved and to take away any fear, take away any pain and help ease things – take away trouble, make things better, make things happy again, if they even ever were before. Don’t know that that line “sail on silver girl, sail on by, time to shine, means. Is there hope? Was there hope? How do you know? How do you hope? How do you live? Will things be okay? Life is messy, love is messy. Things aren’t always okay. Nothing ever is. 

I love going back and looking at what I wrote. It is so interesting to me. I have so many memories. 

Verna’s house was in Viborg, the town where I was born. It was on a corner and was two stories. I think it was white. She drove a Volvo. I always thought that was cool. We visited her whenever we visited Grandma Esther. They were sisters. I wish I could remember her voice. I think it was soft, yet stern. She didn’t let us get away with anything. She was notoriously frugal. She reminded me of Aunt Bea from the Andy Griffith Show. I remember sitting on a step stool at her table all the time watching her do things. Verna did a lot of things. Rest In Peace Verna. Sail On Silver Girl.