Lady in a Rocking Chair

Back … forth … back … forth … she sits in her creaky rocking chair pleasantly reminiscing about her lost childhood as she crochets a warm fuzzy quilt for her granddaughter. Out of nowhere her desire to finish the quilt before noon fades and she find her attention drifting towards the window and looking at a giant maple tree bejeweled in sparkling frost. The tree is old and withered, it has aged immensely; it is somewhat like the old woman … even the texture of the bark is likened to the wrinkles on her face and body. Beyond the bark there is a history of both painful wounds and happy memories, each and every one just as vivid as the next. It is astounding how this tree, such an ordinary and natural commodity can bring back so many fond and colorful memories. One of the lower branches of the tree appears to be mangled and frayed. She remembers it when it was in perfect condition, housing a handmade, wooden swing hanging from a brand new strand of coarse rope. Over the years the rope had turned from a brilliant golden-yellow to an almost brownish-amber. She would come home each day and was always comforted by that same tree and that same swing, though she never understood why because to everyone else, it was just a tree, but to her, it was as comforting as a warm fuzzy blanket. She remembered attending her first day of school when she was a young child. Everything was so unfamiliar to her; new faces, new voices, a whole new world she could then discover on her own, without her mother holding her hand. Unfortunately the fun she expected to have did not go as she could have hoped. It was a seldom occurrence for anyone to ask her to play with them. She spent most of the school day in seclusion quietly playing in the corner with an array of plastic blocks. At certain points she just wanted to cry or go back home to the warm, loving arms of her mother; that is where she felt safe and shielded from the evil of the world.