“Glass” by Patrice Ardiere

There is a memory deep within me, born of my earliest moments of awareness. Not of a room, a toy, or a favorite chair, but a door. Double glass doors to be exact, and the small alcove that lay beyond them. The image has always been with me, wrapped in warmth, making me smile. For this place so ordinary, so unimportant, was once the whole world for a little girl. I was the fourth and youngest child of a busy and crowded family, and I found solace there.          

Sunny afternoons would find me, bathed in brightness. Warm rays of light cascading through the door’s glass panels gave life and grace to the air around me. Tiny unknown particles would float and swirl and be.. something beautiful. I could sit low on the floor in this private place feeling invisible. My nose pressed to the glass watching the others. They all seemed so big to me; doing big people things, making big people noises. For me, this was an anything place. Here I hid from my fears, this place kept my secrets. This was one thing I could do alone. In their big people world, I could do very little. In my cramped corner by the door, they could do nothing. They didn’t fit!          

When I was four years old, we moved away. I can no longer remember the apartment, but I will always see that place behind the glass French doors where I could be anything I wanted. For that tired patch of carpet behind those heavy old doors held my imaginings. My last glance of that place left a terrible ache inside me, as if my best friend had been left behind.

As I look around my own home, it occurs to me that I may have managed to keep a piece of that place with me, in the form of my glass collection. Vases, candy dishes, and platters all adorning my home, making me smile. Like silent soldiers they sit lined up on towels drying now. I study the delicate etched lines of each glistening piece and the sun, as if on cue, spills into the room and across the table bathing them in brightness. I lay my head down against the glass and steal a peek through the prisms, and for a brief moment in time…

I am three again.

©copyright PMD11-20-2011

Patrice Ardiere’s writing focus is people. She helps her reader realize that he/she is not alone, and has found the hero within. The lasting message that all things have purpose and that my reader has value is the ultimate goal.

Ongoing work is a series of children’s fiction for kids with special needs. The heroine of the first book has Selective Mutism. Additional works will address stuttering, deafness, ADD etc. Currently she is writing the third of six stories for a dragon anthology. We are not dragons, but the reader will find many parallels in that strange yet familiar world that relate to self-esteem, choices, growth, faith, fear and of course… love.