Memories, that is. The past is always lying in wait, and invades the present when we least expect it.
Today I was painting, as I do most days, and when I was wiping surplus paint from a palette knife I noticed something engraved on the blade. It was the initials of my late brother. He trained as a chef, and this must have been an item from his kit. He probably kept it for applying icing, or something of that sort. When he died we sorted out his things, and I must have decided that it would do very well as a tool for painting.
Suddenly, there he was, and I was thinking about the crazy choices he made in his life.
I don’t think that we ever understood each other properly, as we had totally different interests and tastes. Consequently I never got to know him properly. Then today I discover that, without my suspecting it, he had taken a small but permanent place in my daily activity.
What a coincidence, though: when I made this discovery I was in the middle of painting a dead soldier. For some strange reason I had given him hair of the same colour as my brother’s.
Beware of memories. They leap out and get you when you are least expecting it, and once they are there you can’t get rid of them.