lately I’ve been spending less time at the memory center. therapy has taken more of my days, and though I know I need it, I still miss being there. I miss the way presence feels in that place: the heartbeats I catch in the quiet of their eyes, the warmth that comes through a hand resting in mine.
on my last visit I brought my guitar. I didn’t play something I wrote. instead, I played a song that had been circling in my own head, one my mom has always loved. maybe you know it, too — it’s called heartbeats.
it felt right in that room. a song carried from my mother’s heart to mine, then offered forward again, into theirs.
I think that’s what I keep learning at the memory center: that even as memory shifts and fades, feeling still remains. music carries it. touch and love carry it.
here’s a small recording from that afternoon, the song we shared together.
cookie nieves 
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