The Ghosts of Summers Past

One of my most beloved summer memories is of the city library. The Killeen Public Library was a classic example of mid-city modern design with a clean, square exterior. I remember climbing the steps and feeling the welcome chill of the air conditioning that battled the Texas heat as the glass doors opened into the bright lobby where, just beyond the front counter, shelves of books were waiting.

On the surface it was stark and almost institutional, but between the shelves where the books lived was a liminal space filled with possibilities. Later I discovered that some libraries are constructed of wood and stone. There are dark, mystical spaces with ornate statues and paintings, visibly steeped in history. I do love a gothic old library, but my first experience taught me that the books in the library are the primary magic. The building is the custodian of that magic, and the librarian is the keeper of the secrets and will share them with you if you ask the right questions.

We moved from ‘the farm’ where I was born, outside of Belton, to Killeen (pop. about 45,000 at the time) just before I finished first grade. I have a vague memory of being ‘the new kid’ at St. Joseph’s Elementary, but I didn’t change schools again after that, so my newbie time was brief. I went through all the grades with the same dozen or so kids (it was a small school) until the culture shock of public high school. I don’t remember much about the summers on the farm. Really, my only clear memory was riding with my dad to the package store on Saturday afternoon for his weekly six-pack of beer, and later sitting on the front porch on Saturday night while my parents drank the beer, talked about the world, and looked at the stars. Nothing else about that time is really a memory, but rather the memory of a story told to me about the years we lived there.

We moved into an apartment the first summer after leaving the farm. My New York City raised mother was so happy in that little space. Killeen was nothing like New York, but it was miles closer than a 65 acre tract of land in the middle of nowhere. She really loved my father, following him through even that miserable adventure. (Caveat, I don’t remember it being miserable – I learned later that we were struggling to survive and almost didn’t make it and that’s why they sold the farm and moved to the city). Anyway, that first summer is a memory of the urban bliss of central air conditioning and the sparkling cool water of the complex pool where I spent most afternoons.

Later that fall, my parents bought a small ranch style house in a nice neighborhood close to the church and school. From there, my summers were spent scouring the library for books which I then carried up the sycamore tree in the front yard. I spent entire afternoons hidden from view and far away in whatever story AI carried up into my leafy hideaway. I roller-skated along the sidewalks, rode my bike, played in the sprinkler in the backyard (where I also searched for fairies in the clover and mimosa tree blooms), caught fireflies, crawdads, lizards and horned toads in the field behind our house, and later accompanied my dad on his afternoon rounds in the ice-cream truck he bought as a side business to earn some extra money and keep himself busy in the summer. He worked for the school district during this time and wasn’t as busy when school was out.

I was one incredibly fortunate kid. This wasn’t lost on me then, or now. Looking back, I can document the evolution of my life, from the age of six, to seventeen, one summer at a time. And it began at the library.

I use the library now, but for eBooks on my Kindle. It’s a different kind of magic, but the excitement of a book that I‘d forgotten I put on hold turning up in my ready-to-borrow list is the same as finding it in the stacks. Because the books are the magic. The library is the custodian of the books. In every form. The library has evolved in order to remain relevant.

It’s now early June, which is summer for all intents and purposes. While I refresh my library app holds and put some new books on my Kindle, I imagine myself climbing the library steps and the anticipation I felt about the cool magic of the shelves filled with books that would carry me away within the stories they held.

This whole stream of consciousness, or whatever you want to call it, has reignited my own storytelling spark.

After several false starts, I’m going to spend more time writing my book. I have no idea if it means I’ll have more to write here, or less, but I’ll still send something to your inbox every week.

If you subscribed way back, my current writing project began as a serial but after six or seven installments I realized that the characters who turned up had much more story to tell. I’ve taken it down from the blog and have since developed intricate family trees and histories for each of them and they’ve been living in my head for quite some time. I spent a lot of time getting to know them, and I’ve left them alone for a while now.

I’ve missed them and they’re ready to tell more of the story. I hope we get to the end, or at least a satisfying pause point, but who knows?

Most weeks writing here, I feel like Leon Hale (see my column about him here https://the-mystics-parlour.ghost.io/the-zen-of-leon-hale/). Developing the genealogy and family histories of the four main characters of The House (working title) makes me feel a bit like Anne Rice. This is more of an aspiration than a reflection of my skill and ability.

The idea for the story comes from a stately old farmhouse that is across the street from where my brother lived in Troy, Texas (population 2,200). It was built sometime around 1900 and several generations raised both families and cattle there. When I first saw the house in the late 1990s, it had been empty for several years and was known in the neighborhood as ‘the haunted house’. Ten years or so later, one of the descendants of the original family moved in and restored the house. The property is now something of a working ranch once more.

My brother died last year and it’s unlikely I’ll ever see the house or visit that part of Central Texas again so, there’s something in that as well. Part of me wants to feel the energy of the land where I grew up. I want to remember what I took for granted like the hills made of rock and caliche, the fields of sunflowers in August, the view from the top of the hill outside of Nolanville which heralded my arrival ‘home’ when I went to visit my mother. All these things live in the very long ago but are still with me. I can’t return to the past, but I can revisit as it becomes part of the world I create within the pages of my own stories.

Well, this has been a ramble, and I’m not sure I ever got where I intended to go. Same as it ever was.

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