Deja Vu

My daughters and I took a day trip today to visit a dear friend in Topeka. On the way there, we indulged in one of my secret weaknesses--singing at the top of our lungs to 80's music. I am apparently inadvertently passing this weakness on to my daughters, as even my five year old can belt out the lyrics to various songs by wonderful artists like Lionel Ritchie, Wham!, Chicago, etc.

As we were cruising down the highway, looking like idiots as we are all singing along with Denise Williams' Let's Hear it for the Boy--and, yes, my twelve and five year old daughters know ALL of the words--I was transported back in time to when I was twelve.

The movie, Footloose, came out when I was in fifth or sixth grade, and that song was part of the soundtrack, so it was on top 40 stations a lot that summer before I was a seventh grader.
I remember that my mom really liked that song, and I distinctly remember singing with abandon along with the radio, much like I did today--only I was the twelve-year-old in the passenger seat, instead of the 30-something mom driving in the car. And it was my baby sister in the back who was singing right along with us. I even remember the car we were in, and the street we were driving down.

I felt an amazing connection--both to my daughters, who will hopefully one day have fond memories of car rides with each other and with me--and to my sister and mother who created the experience with me in the first place.

It is a beautiful gift from God--the mind's ability to remember obscure events from one's past and be blessed by those as much as by the seemingly extraordinary ones.