hungry, hungry hippocampus
january 6, 2008
my mother asked me what i wanted for christmas.
i said, "anise cookies."
she said, "anise cookies."
i said, "yeah, cookies with anise in them."
she said, "i never made anise cookies."
i said, "i know. i think these were store bought."
and over the phone i heard the exhalation of breath, that slow escape where i know that someway, somehow, i've let her down. this is not new. she seems to have a need to be present in every one of my memories. in the moment, i scoff and regress into my 13-year-old self, internally lamenting: mom, can’t I have my own life?! but it's no different, i realize later after i've hung up the phone, than my own desire to be a visceral, not necessarily frequent, part of the mental life of everyone I know. it's always fascinating to me that people have lives before i've met them – and while i have curiosity to learn about those lives, i bore quickly knowing my name will never come up.
i don't think it's narcissism that drives the lack of interest. all the conversations i engage in do not need to revolve around me. it's simpler and more innocent than that: we all want to believe that we matter, the time and emotions we've invested in another person to live within them when we're not around, to do the same for others because we like them, we love them, are proud of them and want them with us. pretty basic and universal.
but often we choose obtuse times to put it to the test. we get upset when of all the christmas-related memories over 26 years, the person we ask responds with nothing that we can remember as shared. we get upset when we learn the keepsake we've treasured and nurtured and believed to be mutual has been completely one-sided. we get disappointed and surprised and frustrated when the inner life we've assigned to someone bleeds over the line we’ve circumscribed for them.
the memories created do not adjust over time, they stay static and unchanging though the people inhabiting them are in a constant state of flux. what then? the corollary drawn from this fact of life means ... what? memories are of the highest value when they're freshest? but that would indicate we've had recent contact with the person in the memory – and thus no real need for the memory at all. and so the question remains: how does one preserve the memory in as pure a state as possible without having it tainted with new information and yet still feel it can be trusted and recalled and believed as the truth? and how can it be assured that the memory another person holds of the same moment is identical? if all this fails, cannot happen because we're all different people, does it follow that memories, despite any connection with another person they may conjure, are inherently lonely?
i said, "anise cookies."
she said, "anise cookies."
i said, "yeah, cookies with anise in them."
she said, "i never made anise cookies."
i said, "i know. i think these were store bought."
and over the phone i heard the exhalation of breath, that slow escape where i know that someway, somehow, i've let her down. this is not new. she seems to have a need to be present in every one of my memories. in the moment, i scoff and regress into my 13-year-old self, internally lamenting: mom, can’t I have my own life?! but it's no different, i realize later after i've hung up the phone, than my own desire to be a visceral, not necessarily frequent, part of the mental life of everyone I know. it's always fascinating to me that people have lives before i've met them – and while i have curiosity to learn about those lives, i bore quickly knowing my name will never come up.
i don't think it's narcissism that drives the lack of interest. all the conversations i engage in do not need to revolve around me. it's simpler and more innocent than that: we all want to believe that we matter, the time and emotions we've invested in another person to live within them when we're not around, to do the same for others because we like them, we love them, are proud of them and want them with us. pretty basic and universal.
but often we choose obtuse times to put it to the test. we get upset when of all the christmas-related memories over 26 years, the person we ask responds with nothing that we can remember as shared. we get upset when we learn the keepsake we've treasured and nurtured and believed to be mutual has been completely one-sided. we get disappointed and surprised and frustrated when the inner life we've assigned to someone bleeds over the line we’ve circumscribed for them.
the memories created do not adjust over time, they stay static and unchanging though the people inhabiting them are in a constant state of flux. what then? the corollary drawn from this fact of life means ... what? memories are of the highest value when they're freshest? but that would indicate we've had recent contact with the person in the memory – and thus no real need for the memory at all. and so the question remains: how does one preserve the memory in as pure a state as possible without having it tainted with new information and yet still feel it can be trusted and recalled and believed as the truth? and how can it be assured that the memory another person holds of the same moment is identical? if all this fails, cannot happen because we're all different people, does it follow that memories, despite any connection with another person they may conjure, are inherently lonely?