The year was 2002 when my son, his wife and I visited his wife's parents in Calimesa, California, southeast of LA.

We were celebrating Christmas there and we borrowed a car to drive out to Yuma, Arizona where we had lived as a family in the 80s.

There were some sense of nostalgia in the air as is always expected when you approach terrain with many fond memories.

Everytime I come to the US I usually renew my wardrobe of undergarments and jeans on Factory 2U and ROSS, the clothes chain, then I expect them to last 'til it's time for my next visit. Jeans with embroidered flowers are among my favorites that I usually walk around with 'til they get ripped. Nowhere else do they have exactly what I want to find.

During this roadtrip I suddenly see something moving in my periferia out in the fields which we are passing. Cheerfully I ask point-blank if it's flamingos out there after which my son and his wife are rolling on the floor laughing and have to drive to the side of the road to a carpark to pause.

Now it has to be said that it was high time for me to change to stronger glasses. Which I usually am doing in Mexico, on occasion, when I visit California as it is pretty close to it. It is tremendously cheap to have it done there as well as dentist appointments.

In other words, at this occasion I had reduced vision. The truth being frankly that it was not flamingos that I saw but Mexican guest workers who were bent down harvesting iceberg lettuce in the fields. I began to laugh myself since laughter always is contagiously spreading. I could see the comical situation. Then it was totally impossible to stop from laughing.

By nightfall we stayed with a relative to my son's wife who were living by a date plantation outside of Yuma where you could hear the coyotes howling.

The descending sunset which is seen in all of it's magical display of color exists only in Arizona. I laughed myself to sleep at long last. The relatives had invited us to BBQ:d Alaskan pollock which they had caught themselves and transported in the aircraft's freeze compartments. A bit further down this trip we're approaching the areas of Yuma in Arizona where so many western movies have been made.

We're passing the typical sand dunes where a lot of people are camping in Winnebagos or trailers to ride the popular four-wheeler bikes in the sand.

When my son went to a private school outside of Yuma in the 80s he threw a small paper plane to a girl and suggested that they'd go to the sand dunes after school. When this happened me and my former husband were called to the principal's office to attend the punishment of our son with a bat for his minor innocent mischief in school. No hard beating but nevertheless so typically US. In Public School where our other kids went it was better in that the parents had to sign a paper if they tolerated punishment or not. This was lucky for us when one of our daughters drew figures of men with tongues hanging out at the teacher in her textbooks...

Yes, memories are flooding and it is fun when they are bright, happy and good ones. Surely we can more often than is done seek out the opportunities for happiness and laughter? I think it's the best path for a lot of good things for both spririt, body and soul and above all a source for the creativity of musicians, poets and other practices of the arts.



(Bibbi 08 May 2008)

L Patrik W Johansson english version 10, 21 & 23 Apr 2013

e-bok:

Poem Gems


Finns utlagd på L Patrik W Johanssons sida också fast med annan bild: "Yumas dadelodlingar"