[mllelystigre]

Do you get them? There are some that come back to haunt me, completely out of the blue on some days. I wish that I could write down the most disturbing ones on a piece of paper, crumple it up, and never have to think about them ever again. Why would someone choose to ruminate over unpleasant memories? Maybe by sharing the following experience, I'll be able to care about it a little less. It happened over fifteen years ago around Christmas.

We were always receiving little holiday goodies from other people; neighbors, co-workers of my father. On one particular evening, he brought home a large plate of an entire assortment of different cookies. To this day, I cannot recall a single fond memory of baking cookies with my mother. She always thought I'd "wreck it."

Anyway, picture this...really picture how you would be feeling as the child in the following scenario: the large plate of assorted cookies is revealed, and the girl eagerly reaches for a Hershey kiss peanut butter cookie. Before she can even grasp the treat, her mother slaps her hand angrily and growls "get your dirty fingers away!" Stunned, the girl sits back in her chair. Her father is there and he says nothing. The mother turns to him, "Dad, was there one that you really wanted?" He looks somewhat taken aback himself as he replies dryly that he actually wasn't interested in any of them. The mother turns back to the little girl, then grants her daughter permission to pick from the plate. She's lost her appetite though, and politely removes herself from the kitchen table. She feels that she was never really wanted there to begin with.

[Open Eyes]

There is usually a theme when it comes to flashbacks and one's sense of feeling loved, safe and having value.