Faded swings

I love travelling, and I must admit that I somehow always feel home. I enjoy all those new tastes, smells and beauties, but I can always recognise something that reminds me of things and places I have already experienced. No matter where I go, what I eat, see, where I sleep. And this is amazing, because the discovery side makes me feel excited, while the predictable side makes me feel comfortable at the same time. I feel alive and safe. What’s better than this?

During my trip in Armenia, though, this feeling of feeling home was way too strong.

Almost bothersome. This was the case especially in Gyumri, in the Shirak province.

While I was walking in the city on the first day, I had the feeling of recognising every single corner.

I almost felt like I had spent my childhood there!

I could clearly see myself as a child running in those streets, playing with my cousins, eating ice creams. I could not only feel safe, but I had a feeling of belonging to that city. I really couldn’t understand why. Something was talking directly to my heart. Like memories waving a me that I could not recognise. Until the veil suddenly dropped.

I was lost in my feelings when a horrible screeching noise sharply interrupted my thoughts. My spine tensed up instantly. That really scared me.

I think nothing could have brought me back to the reality so fast. I found myself walking in a playground. I looked around. That horrible noise was an old carousel turning. It was faded and rusty. Like all the other games in that park.

I sat on one of the two old swings installed on a dry lawn, trying to calm my heartbeat. I put my hands on the chains to hold me and ouch, a piece of dry paint scratched my hand!

I started caressing my wound. Gently. Carefully at first. And then the movement became mechanical. A memory was emerging from the fog.

Yes! That movement! How many times I had already done it? On how many faded and rusty swings I had sat, how many times dry paint scratched my skin?

The sun! That burning sun! That was the answer!

I could clearly remember my childhood in southern Italy and the swings installed on the square in front of my house. A few weeks after being painted, paint already started fading and unsticking. I remembered those boring summer afternoons, when everybody was sleeping, and I would have liked so much to go to the square and play, but both the swing and the carousel were made of metal and were burning because of the midday sun. Impossible to touch.

I went on the swing for a few seconds. And for a few seconds, I could feel like the happy little child I had been many years before.

And then I took a picture, of course. I could not let such sweet memory go. This was too precious.

The yellow swing there is empty. But believe me, if you look intensely, you can see a little girl who is having fun. This little girl is me.

And you? Did anything similar happen to you? What reminds you of your childhood? Send me a message and let me know!