Memory of Feelings
I remember how I felt lying on the grass between her legs or in her dark basement…
I had a realization late last night about memory.
More specifically, about how my memory works. It felt simple in many ways, but it explained why old friends often tell stories I can’t recall.
The simple explanation is that my memory is based more on how I felt and what I thought at the time than on more external factors. So while I might remembering wanting to kiss someone, I don’t know their name or how we met. Likewise, I remember standing in the brook feeling hopeful that I might catch a crawfish (a big one ideally), but I don’t know who else was there with me.
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This may be how memory works for most people, but every time I read a book where someone goes through dialog from the past, I wonder how they can recall even a scrap of it.
How does your memory work? Do you picture scenes? Remember conversations? Recall sights and smells? Feelings? Emotions?
I remember lying on the floor in the dark basement of her house while our friends slept all around us. My heart raced, and I was torn between desire and fear. I don’t remember her words or the color of the blanket we lay upon, but I know she wanted me and didn’t care that I didn’t have a condom. I remember the fear and the guilt when I left, wondering if I had fucked everything up, and I remember the anger that came later when I realized how much pressure I felt to give in.
Later, I remember someone else on the grass in the park. I was eighteen, and she was fifteen, which felt like forever at the time. It’s meaningless now, but then? It was dangerous and enticing, and while we didn’t quite profess love for one another, we felt it.
She lay on her back in a dress raised above her thighs as I lay on my stomach and pushed her underwear to one side so I could taste her. I was full of desire and adoration. I wanted to make her feel good––make her come if possible––and I wanted to stay there forever with no thought of fucking her.
I recently found out she’s one of the biggest spreaders of false vaccine information on the internet, but all I recollect is that she was bright and pretty, and we were both very much alive.
They exist as snapshots with little context.
I don’t remember picking her up or dropping her off. I can barely place the park or the dark basement where I said yes when I wanted to say no. Faces come and go, but for brief seconds, I remember my want and confusion. Those two were always mixed, a sort of back and forth between should I or shouldn’t I?
More recently (if nine years is recent), I remember seeing Piper at a photoshoot for the first time. She was mostly naked in a trunk, and I remember my heart skipping a beat as I gawked.
But I also remember feeling out of place and not quite sure how I belonged. What was my role, how could I or should I participate, and why was she so damn pretty?
They roll through me like sense experiences feeling less and less real except for the physic detritus they left behind.
I remember love mixed in with guilt by the lake, and I remember a hint of anger as I teased her while she talked on the phone. I remember kissing him with uncertainty and wondering if I was right or wrong.
I remember his hug, which felt like home, and her hand reminding me it was alright.
And when I go back further, I remember the safety that came from the warmth of the dog’s fur as she lay in front of the wood-burning stove. I was lonely and unsure, but there was a fire and the smell of hot apple cider with cinnamon bubbling in a pot above.
It was dark but for the flames.
I was safe, I was briefly warm in a cold world, and everything was going to be alright. If I let myself go, that memory lingers forever.