Wednesday, December 16, 2020

DEJA VU

 Wednesday Scribblings, and we’re asked to consider and/or include the phrase “down in my bones”.  I share a visit to Louisiana many years ago, and an experience that taught me the meaning of déjà vu!   Submitted to Poets & Storytellers United. December 16, 2020

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Oak Alley.  The travel guide describes it as a grand example of an antebellum plantation.  I stand spellbound, gazing down the alley of majestic ancient oaks leading to the bayou, from which visitors and supplies arrived.  A soft breeze stirs wisps of Spanish moss on the trees, and I feel a chill.  Deep down in my bones I know I’ve stood on this spot before.  On this very spot.  For an instant I seem to see young ladies in elaborate ball gowns and young gentlemen dressed in Confederate uniform grey.  Only for an instant, then the image fades.  I turn and join the tour group as we ascend the steps.  The eerie feeling of familiarity stays with me as we tour the rooms of this relic of pre-Civil War days.  All my life I’d been a skeptic.  No more. 

10 comments:

  1. Eerie feelings can teleport us. Nice one Bev

    Much💗love

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  2. Certain places, aromas, sounds, can certainly play on our memories or our imaginations. Sometimes it really does feel like it's in our bones.

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  3. Another life, another time, yes.

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  4. I wonder if they you that stood in the glimpse that evoked the feelings saw the you of that day, and also felt that sense of déjà vu.

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  5. We had similar grade school experiences. I say I was in the seventh grade when I sat on Santa's lap after our Christmas program when he let out that he lived on a neighboring farm. We had eight in school, half of us were cousins with me.
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  6. Yes it's pretty convincing once you have an actual experience!

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  7. Some places just invite ghosts of the past to offer themselves up for examination.

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    1. True. I will never forget my Oak Alley experience!

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  8. Beverly, this was a nice tale of your visit to Oak Alley. We have driven past it a dozen times +/- . Mrs. Jim's father was from Thibodaux, Louisiana, and we visited that and New Orleans quite a bit in our earlier years. One time we did spend a three days at Madewood Plantation at Thibodaux.
    https://jimmiehov.blogspot.com/search?q=Madewood+Plantation .
    Thank you for telling about the racer vs razor back hogs. It was a little play on the two words, an unmentioned "razor back" with, begun with the word race, i.e. race, "racer back", my fictitious hog was born. I am glad that you brought this up, thank you.
    Sorry that I am so late in returning your comment, we were out of town for Mrs. Jim's 100 year old cousin's funeral in Baton Rouge. Not much time for blog work, I had started this earlier but skipped a few choices for more verses and skipped to the small again scabies mite problem.
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