Oddly enough, it's your father's watery blue eyes that are figure for me against this rich background of your musings about memory. Go figure! Thanks for another jewel dear Susie.
I loved the first sentence too. I find so much of memory is about feeling ..and I am always amazed to discover a close friend or sibling who was ‘there’ with me at any given time or place may remember a situation very differently than I do.
I kind of like the lyrics to Streisand’s song Memory
Lyrics
Midnight, not a sound from the pavement
Has the moon lost her memory?
She is smiling alone
In the lamplight, the withered leaves collect at my feet
And the wind begins to moan
Memory, all alone in the moonlight
I can dream of the old days
Life was beautiful then
I remember the time I knew what happiness was
Let the memory live again
Every street lamp seems to beat
A fatalistic warning
Someone mutters and the street lamp sputters
And soon it will be morning
Daylight, I must wait for the sunrise
I must think of a new life
And I mustn't give in
When the dawn comes, tonight will be a memory too
And a new day will begin
Burnt out ends of smoky days
The stale, cold smell of morning
A street lamp dies, another night is over
Another day is dawning
Touch me, it's so easy to leave me
All alone with the memory
Of my days in the sun
If you touch me, you'll understand what happiness is
beautifully written. and I can personally relate to so much of it. But your opening sentence is my favorite bit. It is excrutiatingly resonant. A big part of aging for me is meandering around in that undergrowth.
It could be that we pay too much attention to the distinction between waking and sleeping life. All of these events take place in and around your consciousness (or mine if I'm the dreamer).
I always wonder about my memories—how many are narratives that I, and others, have repeated so often that I believe them. A Buddhist friend recently wrote me that he has been practicing observing his thoughts for the last year, and he now wonders if thinking is just another one of our senses. He seems to be demoting thinking. Mark Epstein wrote a book called “Thoughts Without a Thinker. “ I’m not sure if how we construct and nurture our memories fits in here. But your post gives me a lot to think about, and that’s one of my favorite hobbies.
It's astonishing to me that I read that Buddhist gem for the first time earlier today. Thinking as the sixth sense. Why does that strike you as a demotion?
I agree that our culture privileges thinking. Given that...it might be useful to balance that by treating it as if it were a sense. Sometimes it seems we are so in our heads that we don't even know that there are other ways of apprehending reality.
Oddly enough, it's your father's watery blue eyes that are figure for me against this rich background of your musings about memory. Go figure! Thanks for another jewel dear Susie.
He was a sweetheart. You two would have gotten along famously.
I loved the first sentence too. I find so much of memory is about feeling ..and I am always amazed to discover a close friend or sibling who was ‘there’ with me at any given time or place may remember a situation very differently than I do.
I kind of like the lyrics to Streisand’s song Memory
Lyrics
Midnight, not a sound from the pavement
Has the moon lost her memory?
She is smiling alone
In the lamplight, the withered leaves collect at my feet
And the wind begins to moan
Memory, all alone in the moonlight
I can dream of the old days
Life was beautiful then
I remember the time I knew what happiness was
Let the memory live again
Every street lamp seems to beat
A fatalistic warning
Someone mutters and the street lamp sputters
And soon it will be morning
Daylight, I must wait for the sunrise
I must think of a new life
And I mustn't give in
When the dawn comes, tonight will be a memory too
And a new day will begin
Burnt out ends of smoky days
The stale, cold smell of morning
A street lamp dies, another night is over
Another day is dawning
Touch me, it's so easy to leave me
All alone with the memory
Of my days in the sun
If you touch me, you'll understand what happiness is
Look, a new day has begun
Thank you, Kathy. Memory remains a shared aspect of human experience and a deep well of speculation. What is it? How does it work?
That’s for sure. Sometimes I shut my eyes and try to feel my way around the bathroom. Obviously, I have too much time on my hands🤣🤣
beautifully written. and I can personally relate to so much of it. But your opening sentence is my favorite bit. It is excrutiatingly resonant. A big part of aging for me is meandering around in that undergrowth.
Do you ever stumble upon something whose veracity is in doubt? Like you're not sure it really happened? I do...but what the hell. It's all material.
sometimes I dream about something and later, in waking life, I am actually not sure if it "really" happened.
It could be that we pay too much attention to the distinction between waking and sleeping life. All of these events take place in and around your consciousness (or mine if I'm the dreamer).
I always wonder about my memories—how many are narratives that I, and others, have repeated so often that I believe them. A Buddhist friend recently wrote me that he has been practicing observing his thoughts for the last year, and he now wonders if thinking is just another one of our senses. He seems to be demoting thinking. Mark Epstein wrote a book called “Thoughts Without a Thinker. “ I’m not sure if how we construct and nurture our memories fits in here. But your post gives me a lot to think about, and that’s one of my favorite hobbies.
It's astonishing to me that I read that Buddhist gem for the first time earlier today. Thinking as the sixth sense. Why does that strike you as a demotion?
It doesn’t actually. It’s just that I believe our culture mostly privileges
“thinking.” So I am working with that idea these days.
Re childhood memories. I both cherish mine and learn from them, but I take them all with a grain of salt. The mind is a slippery sense.
I agree that our culture privileges thinking. Given that...it might be useful to balance that by treating it as if it were a sense. Sometimes it seems we are so in our heads that we don't even know that there are other ways of apprehending reality.