Memories
are who we are
I
always thought I would have enough room. For memories. I thought I’d have the
space. I thought I’d have the time
and the freedom to toss them about like old paint cans, some onto the “For
Recycling“ stack in the garage, others onto benches and shelves and closets for
later. I could forget about them until I needed them. Open, stir up what’s
inside, use, then put the lid back on. Save them for later. Save them, sure, and not
think about them too much. There’s plenty of time, right?
Memories
of all kinds—epic stories, battles, king lists and terrible gods; all the
imaginings and daydreams, wishes and shivery fears, true memories and half-real
memories, some that are easier to hold onto than others; some that are small and breathlessly intimate: like the wet,
sun-warmed cement deck at the community pool; flat rocks by the lake, and
body-warm water in motion in the wave-and wind-cut shallows; voices, eyes,
touch; my hand over her electric pubis; shame and sunshine through the glazed
glass in the half-window of the front door coat closet.
I
should confess about these memories. They were stirred to the top by a rather
potent dose of modern marijuana. I know—the old stoner is stoned. Boring. Nonetheless, for a few hours
the drug opened a floodgate. The memories were mostly small, intimate ones. At
times, they were like shards of glass that cut; at other times they were like pieces
of a puzzle that seemed to multiply; one you could never complete it. They
became a torrent of detail I felt compelled to watch and acknowledge. Each
memory was like a badge or tile inserted neatly into an intricate
and colourful mosaic. It became a huge wall full
of impressions of my
life as I remembered it, or seemed to remember. Hey, man, it was trippy.
But
they were memories—how could they be
anything else? Even the ones where I had to think: “Was that real or was it from a
movie or daydream? Did I have that conversation with that person? Was the sky
blue after the rain that day?” The memories seemed to come with ‘tags’ and
were ordered in tiny, neat, little boxes made of smooth, coloured stone, like
polished stone boxes in an elaborate mosaic on the wall
before me—receptacles of information and reference, like the file card
indexes libraries once held.
It
may have been a kind of visual hallucination but it was as if I could touch a
‘card box’ or stone mosaic on the memory wall and the memory it contained would open
up for me. I recognized them; I remembered them, experienced some
of them, as if it were for the first time, though I knew I had examined and held them
many times in the past, including the original, first time. Images, words, faces—(hurt faces, happy faces); all
manner of places, things; bugs and beetles, clouds and storms, weather
and seasons; sights and sounds and smells, and people. There were so many memories choose from! But then I grew frightened. What if
I went through them all? They were all there, listed and catalogued; a lifetime
of experiences at my disposal; from the earliest down to the very last, most recent file. But when I went through them all, what would happen? Would my life be over?
*“The Nine Billion Names of God”, by Arthur C.
Clarke
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