There is a curse
associated with a memory like mine.
Like, I can remember with perfect clarity, the last time I saw my father outside a casket, on a stainless slab at St James Hospital. I can remember the way it felt the first time someone kicked me hard in the nads. I can remember in exquisite detail walking in on my ex-inlaws in flagrante delicto.
There are a million of those memories I would love to have an erase button for; Most of the time my piss poor retrieval system protects me from the worst of them, but sometimes something triggers the old synapses and a creature climbs out of the old memory hole and assails me with it’s obscene clarity.
I someties wince at those old moments that come out, but most of the time I can get some stupid song stuck in my head and drive the rest of the crap out.
On the other hand, I can remember when the nurse put my infant daughter in my arms for the first time, and the memory is far better than any picture. I can see the dirt on her little shoes as she squishes beans into the indiana loam for the first time at six. I can see the flush in her face as she wins her first fencing match. I remember the smile on her face when she graduated 8th grade and the church had a bat loose inside making everyone giggle.
I’ll happily take the bad with the good. If i live long enough to develop Dementia, I figure I can make ten good years on the good memories alone.
Smells, man. Smells can bring a long-buried memory back to my forebrain faster than a bullet and with the same force. Fer instance, that institutional food service smell takes me back to first grade in the school cafeteria showing off by drinking milk through my nose. Pert shampoo reminds me of a certain girl, her face crystal clear to my mind’s eye when I haven’t thought of her in years.
However, I can’t remember to grab a new bar of soap before I am completely soaked in the shower.
As I approach 62 years of age, I find that random memories of the past assault me. Most are stupid things I’ve done and regret. I wish that I could change them, but I can’t.
I’ll try to focus on my successes and on the good things that I’ve experienced.
The memory is a fickle and, sometimes, scary thing.
Indeed, Slash! I had a girl who smelled like fabric softener all the time. Laundry day always minds me of her. I had a gradeschool teacher who used to lean her big boobs over me that smelled of Windsong. Yes, smells are a very powerful trigger.
Dry cleaning solvent reminds me of washing aircraft in Iceland (Converted DC-3’s and one DC-6). Brings back those memories with crystal clarity. You gents are quite correct.
Smells. Miss Helton in third grade.
A certain beach in So. Cal., Palm Springs just before she passed.
The bad- from the smell of agent orange to the sight of a stillborn great grandson last month.
A life lived will give a man nightmares or a hardon. It is what it is.
Smells are indeed a large trigger. I once read and article that explained why that was.
I expect these memories, both good and bad fill a special need in us.
The bad to remind us of the fact we indeed need to be forgiven for breathing, and the good to remind on why we want to be forgiven.
A man with out bad memories cannot appreciate the good.
YMMV.