Green Gumdrops

It was a windy day  in Texas today.  The kind of wind that kiss my cheeks, painting them a rosy residue.  The kind of wind that gently curls the little wisps of hair that refuse to fit into my ponytail.  The kind of wind that passes through my olfactory neurons and swirled up in my cerebrum generously giving me the sweet smell of mint.  I don't smell the  mint often, so when I do, it takes me to a time in my childhood that will forever bring joy to my soul. 
      I was seven years old when I visited my great grandmas house in Ohio.  A small town named after a Revoluntionary War hero.  When I say a small town, I mean one bank, a couple of schools, a grocery store and this little restaruant called Pauls Dine In.  Pauls was one of my favorite places to eat.  They had this sausage cheese burger that made glutony an understatement. 
   My great grandmas name was Golda.  Her hair was a vintage cut, curly like wind blown ivory lillies.  Freckles covered her shoulders, as if someone sprinkled brown sugar on them.  Lips a ruby stain.  She was my grandmothers mother.   
     She lived in a tiny house with a crickity screen door that she would leave open so she could hear me play outside.  I could never get that screen door to shut.  She had this special trick to close it.  The furniture in her house was little.  A little couch.  Two little chairs.  One little TV.  The kitchen table that once sat in her dining room now sits in my mothers house, neatly polished.  She had an old fashioned phone, cream colored that hung on the wall in the dining room.  You know, the kind where you had to put your finger in that little spinner thing and spin each number?  Yeah, that kind.  She had a big back yard, filled with flowers of every color and smell.  Sometimes I would find her planting in her garden, lost in flowery lyrics-her head draped in a red sun hat.   
    There are many memories I have of my great grandmother.  However, one just really seems to stick out the most.
    It was a warm summer morning when I awoke in the back bedroom of her house.  A queen sized rod iron bed that caved in at the middle bid me good morrow as I pulled myself to sit up.  My New Kids on the Block pajamas were wrinkled  from the late night tossing and turning, not too mention they were getting a little too small.  I don't remember going to sleep in that bed.  I must have snuck in during the night.  I remember being scared of going to bed alone in that back bedroom.  I had a little twin size bed that I was tucked into every night but I was haunted by the dark closet with no door.  My mind would play tricks on my eyes and I would sneak in the back bedroom where my grandmother slept.  There was something about snuggling next to Sandra Ann that made everything scary disappear.  Her perfume was my lullaby.
      I planted my feet onto the cold old-fashioned hardwood floors.  I stretched and admired the sun light that was shining in on me.  I breathed in the sweetness that settled in that house.  I could hear faint conversations in the kitchen and dishes being clanked together.  I could smell coffee brewing and the morning paper was being read as the comics were being shuffled around.  I walked down the long hallway and brushed my fingertips over the picture frames of old family members I never knew. 
    A picture of my mother hung slanted.  I loved how I looked like her. 
    I made my way into the livingroom and saw my neighborhood friends playing on their kick and go's outside.  If your not familiar with a kick and go, it's a little scooter with a pump on the back of it.  That is how you built speed.  My kick and go was in the basement.  Scary basement.  Where the washing machine rumbled and shook and where the coat hanger looked like a person looming in the shadows.  My grandma must have heard me shuffling around because she shouted out a " good morning sugar".  I made my way into the kitchen anticipating my morning hugs and kisses.  My greatgrandmother would hold me and rock me to a silly song. 
    I remember going into her kitchen when a minty aroma embraced me.  I loved it.  I didn't know where it was coming from.  It was so fresh, so spicy so... so.. MINTY!!!  My curiosity spilled the beans that I was on the hunt for something sweet.  My grandma opened her cabinet and pulled out a bag of green gumdrops-minty.  They were these little green chewy candies showered with sparkly sugar and awesomeness.  They made her house smell like a minty wonderland.  They became my favorite thing to eat when I would visit.  Perhaps it's because it triggered memories of that morning.  I wanted each visit to be the same.  I sure loved that house.  I sure loved them. 
 I sure do love when the wind blows just right- because I think of something beautiful.