garage door
Looks like a normal garage door right? Well, it’s not it is the garage door at our school. It is the one where I keep our recycle wagon for the school and parish. You see, I coordinate a recycle program for our parish as well as our school helping the entire parish to stay “Green”. I started the program 5 years ago. It is so good for our children to get into the recycling habit and for the adults as well! This garage contains a small yellow wagon I use to pull the recycle boxes to the trailer to be recycled. Once a week I take the wagon out and load it up and when I am finished I put it back.
About 4 summers back after recycling the office papers from various offices in the school and the parish I put the wagon back in this garage. As I was pulling the door down I put my 2 fingers in between an opening of that door where it folds when opened. The weight of the garage door was heavier than I had anticipated and it slammed to the ground with my fingers stuck in the now shut crack. All the weight of the garage door sat upon my two fingers and I screamed with such pain that I believe my Dad heard me down the street (he was babysitting my children at that time). Realizing rather quickly that no one was present to help me I had to pull the door open with my free hand, my adrenaline was pumping and I made quick work of it. As I released my fingers I saw that they were smashed but not broken. I ran to the nearest office and ran cold water across them. Before I left I had to shut that garage door once more. Since that time I have recycled once a week and without fail every time I hear that door slam the ground I tuck in my fingers and feel that pain once more. It is as though the sound takes me straight back to that moment and that memory instantaneously. You know how a song can put you right back at that high school dance, or the smell of cinnamon bread reminds you of your mom’s kitchen when you were a child?
It is simply amazing all the memories our minds contain and yet we hardly ever seem to find them. More amazing is how quickly those memories can be triggered whether they are good or terrifying. It’s as though we have sweet and scary surprises with no warning to us. Maybe God made our minds that way so that we can remember, so we can learn and we can recall. Our minds are cluttered with so many thoughts it is hard to find the memories very often. I thank God for the chance to experience them again the good and the bad.
