One Pecan Tree

Jim Croce's gentle songs are playing in the background as I sort the photos into the stages and ages. Manila folders with dates and events written on the tabs wait for me to choose them.  The sorting of one's life would be like a series of business transactions but for the gentle voice and rhythms of Jim Croce.  His music putting life in the photos as I pick each one up and put into its 'place'.

Gene and John Adcock, circa 1975

The smooth chords from the strings of the guitar stroke my buried sensual self, too.  My mind drifts back to the years of passion, the years of yearning for my husband's touch.  Waiting for the sound of his vehicle pulling into the driveway.  Hiding, unclothed in the closet where he would be hanging his coat.  Waiting breathlessly for the door to open.  The door opens and he says, "You crazy thing, get some clothes on!"  No, really, he did.  Later......, well, that is enough of that.

Still the music does take me back to those years of our early marriage, late 60's, early 70's.  Working together to build a home and a life together.  To build a family together.  Our years of hoping for a baby.  Applying for an adoption that never came because we conceived - just not the "closet day."  Raising our son.  Working and fighting and arguing and making up all rolled into a life together.  A life together that was denied to Jim and Ingrid Croce by a simple mistake and a tree.

It is ironic that this man, Croce, who was finally beginning a successful ascent in his career was killed by an ordinary pecan tree.  One tree the pilot failed to clear or see at the end of a small town airport runway.  The plane was headed to another small town named Sherman, Texas, located about 35 miles from where "the closet" was.  One is left to wonder what other beautiful songs would have come from the heart and mind of Croce.  Songs of the joy about their wonderful son, AJ.  Songs of sorrow for the child lost at birth just weeks before the crash.  More songs to play while I sit and sort photos of my life.  

But for one pecan tree.

Jim and AJ Croce
source:  http://jimcroce.com/

guitar strings vibrate

music from past decades fills

the emptiness of time

©  Janice Adcock