Memory

What triggers a memory is super weird, when you think about it. We went out to the coast last weekend and stayed in a little beach house that was built in the 40s, probably from a kit and all. The place we stayed in had ceiling tiles in a style that I haven't thought about in ages, even while dreaming about redoing the ceiling in our condo because it's fucking popcorn. But the tiles looked exactly like the ceiling tiles in my Yaya's house did, and if you'd asked me what they looked like before this weekend I wouldn't have been able to tell you, but as soon as I laid on the bed and looked up at them I remembered.

I ate a bite of taffy and somehow the taste of it reminded me of the smell of the pizza place where my mom used to stop and pick up pizza on Friday on our way home. The dark wood, the vinyl seats, the smell of the onions and the spices and the cheese. How a dill-flavored taffy managed that, I'm not sure, but it was incredibly specific and clear.

I've been thinking about descriptions in fiction lately because I follow a couple of fanfic writers who write incredibly lush, vivid descriptions of places and it makes me want to do that more thoroughly when I'm writing.