it was an experience
January 26, 2002 08:18 PM

Memory has been on my mind.

The nature of it, specifically. The things that are experiences. The way they're tinted and refracted with the emotion of having been there.

And then, of course, feeling you're there now.

This is often less a journal than a series of memories. Obscure, emotional, likely recognised only by those who were there, who shared them. But even the specifics of my sense memories will eventually be obscure and barely recognisable at all.

and if you must put me in a box
make sure it's a big box
with lots of windows

Suppose what you'll remember in a year. In five. Ten. Creep on by whatever increment you choose. It becomes more and more a series of emotions. Senses.

Older recollections stick in my eyes, burn my nose and my tongue. They're not events, but passing touches of sense. Some are colder, glimpses of an email on a screen or the sound of a voice crackling miles away. A note I sent him about sticking my hand in the fire, the tone of the responsive phone ring.

and a door to walk through
and a nice high chimney
so we can burn burn burn
all the things that we don't like

We were trying to suppose what made memory. What would be remembered about things that died over the past year. Would there be nostalgia for something missed? Is the world truly different?

And you know. The thing is. It's been an experience. If I've learned from journalling, I've learned this.

There was excess. There was slow and obvious loss. There was shock. There was experience.

And we shared it. Whether I know you or not, we shared it. We were there. If I'm ever to place the past year under review, that's what happened. We shared an experience. In ten years, maybe it will be buzzwords. Dot-com. Meltdown. Nine One One. But those words will still mean something.

Like the smell of a pastoral amusement park, those words stand for something. They stand for an experience. It will eventually be just a feeling of being damp and affectionate and crying in cars. But it was shared.

and watch the ashes
fly up to heaven
maybe all the way to india
i'd like that

It was an experience. And it was shared.