Human nature is a funny thing.
Like a little patch of darkness that we carry around, we sometimes have to find a way to put things behind us. The good, bright lights that catapult moments into sparkly lights are things we want to re-create and re-experience. The bad, it simply gets associations that, once measured, we cannot shake again.
You have a wonderful evening. An evening full of laughter and glimmering joy. That joy radiates around you and in you, and when the night passes it weaves its way into your memories. That moment in time, that place, it held something in you and gave you hope. And yet if you were to try to re-create it something would be done slightly differently, a permutation would arise which would alter the algorithms of the night. It wouldn’t be ruined, but it wouldn’t be the same. The memory of the original event needs to hold, and needs to be held sacred. Our minds tease us by trying to have us grab more than one golden apple and, hands already full, the new apple gets a slight bruise on it.
When something bad happens we make associations. Those associations are then unable to be escaped from, a duvet of grief that we simply cannot change. Maybe it was a sharp word that was barked under the mantle of too much wine. Maybe it was a trip in a sidewalk which caused us to wreck our nicest pair of tights. It could be anything. The affiliation we make may be inconsequential but it is sewn into our consciousness forever.
During my last miscarriage, I watched episode after episode of Scrubs. It required me to not think too much and it never got too emotionally complicated. To this day when I see Scrubs on TV I am reminded of endless gushing blood in the bathroom and endless gushing tears on the sofa. It’s a bittersweet memory, this, knowing what I do now that ultimately life would turn around in the form of two little people arriving almost a year later. You cannot forsake one miscarriage for the sake of a success, it doesn’t work like that. It’s simply an association. Zack Braff and disappearing lines on pregnancy tests. I celebrate for Joanna and I hurt for Sarah and I hurt for HFF, who both are going through a very difficult time. I wonder if they have a TV series they can numbly watch, one that will let them not think and can be something that they shelve, someday, and with it a piece of what they’re going through. Shelved, but never forgotten. No, not that.
When I think of bad things in my past – my own blunders or of transgressions perpetrated against me – it takes my breath away. Sometimes literally. I have to bury my head in my hands or hum a little tune to stop thinking about the screw-ups I have committed, because focussing on what I have done wrong is somewhat of a specialty of mine. Hot-headed moments where I couldn’t control my temper, painful times where I couldn’t control my emotions. I’d wish for a magic wand to erase some of them, if not to create more head-space to create more. I accept that I learn from them, I just wish that I could learn in isolation. Or if humans could assign a mathematical value to a mess-up, put it on the scoring tables and move on. I got drunk at a party and insulted the host – that’s a 7. I wasn’t there when a friend needed me – that’s a 29. Have a league table, and then let it go.
We cannot re-create the good moments, it doesn’t work. We carry them around inside of us, a little golden bulb of the past that we shake from time to time, to watch the glitter swirl around, to give our life a luster. An evening over the caldera of Santorini. A little pair of arms wrapped around our necks, holding on with all they have. A walk barefoot through the grass.
We humans need a convenient device to stop looking backwards, because it prohibits moving forwards. Our feet get caught in a tangled web of foggy memories. We can choose to remain in the stygian reaches of our memories or we can cut the cord. Harsh words were uttered that time we walked down that road…but that was then. Those words are gone. I tripped and fell and ruined my best tights, but I know what to look for now, I know I needn’t fall again if I just pay a bit more attention, look around instead of having my head in the clouds.
Life is messy.
I wonder, sometimes, if being human makes it more so
-S
PS – I am ok, honest (just a bit tired), these are just reflections.
For me in one of my miscarriages it was Gilmore Girls. I am not sure I had deliberately saved them but I certainly had a slew of episodes on Tivo. I hope I won’t have any more miscarriages (one good thing about the implant) but I still save various series for other TV watching emergencies (the flu, a stack of exam marking…)
You’ve captured a lot of what I’m feeling right now. Not sad per se (other than for others, desperately sad for others…), but reflective. Aware. Of what I’ve done wrong in the past and how I try to hide it from myself. Of what others have done too, but also how I try to downplay my part of it.
I’m reading a book about cognitive dissonance right now – how we try to deal with conflicts in our feelings or beliefs. It’s quite revealing. But I think understanding it helps with the score giving and moving on, as you so eloquently wished for.
Life is messy. And beautiful. But oh so messy.
So, so true. Its funny how even a certain scent can bring back a flood of memories and the emotions they are anchored to. To be honest, there are still certain songs I associate with really negative feelings, and to this day I will turn the station every time one of them comes on.
This was a beautifully written piece, by the way.
I really hate those moments where I get to relive what a jackass I was when I was younger.
Life is messy. When it’s not, it’s not really lived, is it?
Providing wonderful insight into the growth, development and raising of children inadvertently helping others to realize they too could, would enjoy raising a child – that’s a +100.
One of the great tragedies (for me) is that even the good memories can bring me down a bit. For example, my trip to Scotland w/ Angel1 was glorious, but now when I look at the pictures, I almost get a melancholy feeling. It’s the missing of what I once had/did.
It might seem a cruel joke by God not to let me fully enjoy the good memories, but He’s very good to me in that He made me such that I don’t dwell too long on the bad memories. Most of the time I have a “What’s done is done” attitude w/ regard to bad things (whether I do the bad or have it done to me). That helps a lot in life.
Posts like this are why so many of us care so deeply about you. You are we and we are you… (to paraphrase the Beatles). x
For me it is the the ABC late night news. They were up while I was grieving, and I oddly grateful for that. I’m glad you’re writing again. I’ve missed your posts.
While I must confess that I miss you posting more often, I’m happy that the quality of your posts haven’t changed. This is definitely one of your better ones. Once again, you put into words the very feelings that I recently have been harboring in my own head, something I could never quite describe. I too have a bad habit of trying to chase good memories, those brief moments in life that you never want to end, sort of like the Nexus in the movie Star Trek: Generations (one of my sentimental faves). And I also tend to wallow or beat myself over the head with bad memories, particularly the ones where I was at fault in some way or another.
If you ever find a device that keeps us from looking back at the bad times (but relish the good) I’m game. I’ll even rent it from you.
You put it well. If I had a dime for every time I tried to recreate a good memory I’d be rich. I have this inane need to recreate good times from my past and I learned a valuable lesson at Christmas. I will no longer try to recreate past moments, only future ones. I associate Scrubs with a happier time passing away evenings alone in my then boyfriend’s (now fiancé’s) condo waiting for his return from sea or the weekends.
The day my mom died, I flew across the country and the only thing that held me together was watching Conan O’Brien host the Emmys. There will always be that memory associated with the Emmys and with Conan. There’s also a feeling of appreciation, because I know if I hadn’t been amused by his monologues, I wouldn’t have held it together on that flight.
I guess it’s odd that we hold onto the things associated with bad memories, and not as much with the good ones – I cannot for the life of me remember what was on TV or what music was playing for any of the better moments in life. Our minds are strange creatures.
That comment closing thing is hard to cope with for those of us who don’t check blogs that often. I was going to say, I’m so sorry about all of that and sympathise re the haemmerhoid – they hurt like a bugger. One tip I got on line if you are still suffering is to fill a condom with water, tie a knot in it and put it in the freezer, then when it’s frozen take it out, wrap it in a napkin and put it against the, ahem, affected area. Quite effective.
D—I think part of it is because when we’re having the golden moments, we don’t tend to be paying attention to the TV or the music as much. I still remember the best ordinary day of my life. Nothing in particular happened that day except that it was a beautiful day.
Beautiful post. Hit home for me.
Memories are not, as I once thought, static. They are sort of like a JPEG file- they are subject to a little change every time we open and examine. I think how we look and how we examine plays a role in the saved result.
Thank you.
Beautiful post. Hit home for me.
Memories are not, as I once thought, static. They are sort of like a JPEG file- they are subject to a little change every time we open and examine. I think how we look and how we examine plays a role in the saved result.
Thank you.
Perfectly written and perfectly true. The funny thing is I had THREE seperate people sit me down last year to apologise for a dreadful thing they thought they had done in my past and I didn’t remember ONE of the events – not one! Things that had haunted them for years and I didn’t recollect them at all until they raised them again. A girl from high school who had been mean to me at a school event because she perceived I had stolen her boyfriend, my youngest sister causing a drunken scene on Christmas day 13 years ago and a lady I worked with who told me she back stabbed me to management enough that I didn’t get a travel opportunity that had been in the offing so her friend could acompany her on the trip. Made me feel a little better about some of the “terrible” things I percieve I have done. F xx
We’re still mourning the death of my brother-in-law. He was murdered at home on his farm in mid-February, and I’ve received (of all things!) Glee from a friend. Been tearing through it. The hilariously over the top characters and the great arrangements of the songs make me forget for a little while. I hope I won’t always equate Glee with grieving, though.
Beautiful post xXx
these are to say the least,very deep thoughtful contemplations and they are lovely and true. I love the part “I have to bury my head in my hands or hum a little tune to stop thinking about the screw-ups I have committed” because I can relate, that moment ware you you let that thought back in but then try to shut it out like humming would cause some sort of allergic reaction and make it run away again. I can’t imagine what you’ve been through or the hardships you may have faced but i do hope that the joy filled moments you’ve experienced have created a place of happiness for you that you can swiftly reflect upon when the thoughts of times gone wrong cross your mind or when you simply need a reference to make you smile.