Remembering what was, an event or a name, is not frightening in itself, it’s what tricks memory can play on ones mind that scares me.
A young child, learning to walk, speak, trust, be a human stores so much away but also leaves many lessons behind. Almost no one, if anyone, can visualize when they took their first step or said their first word and yet that word stays with them for decades to come. A memory is but an image of what you thought was true.
When you sit down with a parent or grandparent to reminisce about years gone by it’s funny to be a witness to such a conversation but may be frustrating to take part in it. To understand that neither party remembers exactly what happens but both being stubborn to let go of their vision, the witness ponders the possibilities of what really happened.
And then we get older and have learned so much and continue to lose some aspects of ourselves we promised never to. Repetition becomes our sanity as it takes away that of those around us. Notes left, confirmations sought, stories changed with each cycle and we all just accept this as our memory being finicky.
If only we could remember our dream or that story or magnificent idea we had while falling asleep. Then we’d all be millionaires but instead the image or thought from last night is like trying to find fish in the rain. And maybe the idea wasn’t so remarkable but it did keep you awake far past the point of exhaustion.
To pick up a book or movie, read the description and fall in love with the tale only to read the first chapter and be overcome with a sense of deja vu. Would figuring out how to use 100% of our brain help or hinder our selective remembering?
So many scary aspects of what may have been history and what is to come only confirms why I write what’s in between as there’s no one to argue with me that it didn’t happen quite like that.
Thanks for reading,
Sarah Butland