Night lifts. The trees and roof-lines are shrouded in fog. The world feels far through this cotton glass. The lattice pattern on the black, faux wrought iron table, shines glazed in dew. Traffic hums but only when I listen. A single chirp counts the slow beat of morning – maybe it’s a chickadee…
The family across the street from where I used to live and where my daughter grew up is having a yard sale tomorrow. I know this because they posted a yard sale sign to a Facebook group for that town – a group I still belong to. I’d be exaggerating to say a rush of feelings came back, but seeing the address reminded me, “hey wow, I used to live there. I know that guy.”
This past week has been a difficult week for news from Memphis, TN. A woman was abducted and killed – she was a mother and schoolteacher out on an early morning jog. In a separate incident someone went on a shooting spree. 19 hours, 7 shooting locations, 4 killed, 3 injured. I still have some friends in Memphis (Facebook friends). I feel sad for the city. I thought about some of the people I used to know and the places I used to go.
Sometimes I wonder if I would be better off not receiving news from places I’ve lived. Is the fact that I still belong to a Facebook group for Lower Makefield, or receive news updates from Memphis a sign that I’m holding on to the past? Do other people follow Twitter and Facebook feeds from people and places they once knew? And how fascinating to think that accessing this granular, hyper-local, person-level news wasn’t really possible twenty years ago. What news one received was either from a phone call or the newspaper or the early pre-social media version of the net.
Even in asking myself that question about holding on, I feel the need to “argue” against those people who might try to wipe away their past. And maybe argue isn’t the right word, I try to imagine who they might be and how their brains might work. Is it possible to not think about or remember the past? Do such people (outside of brain conditions and injuries) exist? People intentionally without pasts or connections to place?
For me, this is an interesting space to contemplate. Buddhism focuses on the present moment. Poetry sometimes (often) focuses on the past. Good storytellers – boisterous Bob at the bar – regale us with funny or outrageous anecdotes from the past. Visionaries paint aspirational pictures of the future. Is the present, despite being all we really have, that boring or that undesirable? Are people who think primarily of their past or dream of some better future dissatisfied with the now? The night has lifted, and the trees are shrouded in fog. It seems important to look up and see this moment – which is always fleeting, and for me, poses two questions: will I remember this, and does that matter?
I once dated a woman who got a new tattoo of a butterfly every time something difficult, traumatic, or major happened in her life. She had seven butterfly tattoos. We weren’t together long enough to talk about each one. I have two small wooden boxes on a shelf – they have the ashes of two of my cats. In a box in the basement, I have ticket stubs from concerts and programs from my daughter’s recitals. I have a shoe box of cards with sentiments that once rang true. A handmade book/journal someone once gave me. My neighbor has a small plot in his yard with flowers and tombstones for his pets. Someone I know through Facebook routinely posts pictures from his travels around the world – three years, four years, five years ago. Another ex – the writer with the blog – has avoided having any type of a digital footprint except for her blog from 2011 – a marker of sorts that signifies a different life – the one thing she wants the outside world to see. On a daily basis I either post, or think about what I have posted here – my small monolith to myself, my thoughts, and my past.
I’m not sure why we hold on to our pasts or stay connected with them. I’ve thought about unfollowing some of these news feeds, but there’s a certain comfort in the recognition: this was a space I inhabited, this was something I cared about. There’s a discomfort in disconnecting. Perhaps we hold on because we can all imagine a point, that deathbed moment when there is no future and all we’ll have, if we’re lucky, is our ability to remember. Pausing here… it’s almost impossible to think of what I might want my last memories / visions to be. I hope there are many more people to know and unscripted moments to make… but if it happened today, if the window shade were closing, who are the people, places, and moments I’d like to see and remember? I’m pretty sure it would only be good things, because at that point, there’s no room or time for the bad. And suddenly I imagine there are some people who may only remember bad things… bitter or hurt to the very end… Will any of my minor characters step forward? Will it be small moments like those sunsets over the Mississippi or is reverie reserved for the momentous? What are the things that will bring a smile to my face? I’m pretty sure I hope to be smiling when I go.