I remember / je me souviens

I remember / je me souviens

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For those limbic bursts of nostalgia, invented by Proust, miniaturized by Nicholson Baker, and freeze-dried by Joe Brainard in his I remember and by Georges Perec in his Je me souviens.

But there are no fractions, the world is an integer
Like us, and like us it can neither stand wholly apart nor disappear.
When one is young it seems like a very strange and safe place,
But now that I have changed it feels merely odd, cold
And full of interest.
--John Ashbery, "A Wave"

Sometimes I sense that to put real confidence in my memory I have to get to the end of all rememberings. That seems to say that I forego remembering. And now that strikes me as an accurate description of what it is to have confidence in one's memory.
--Stanley Cavell, The Claim of Reason

Monday, June 03, 2002

I remember, remembering my grandmother's camera, that there was a little grassy area, a sort of elevated terrace, down Haven Avenue, overlooking the river, where she used to like to take out pictures. When Columbia Presbyterian built up the medical center they must have got rid of it.

I remember awnings, and how some buildings had them and others not.

I remember that your heart skips a beat if you sneeze (though I doubt this).

I remember Clark Graebner and Stan Smith. I saw both of them play at Forest Hills. I remember Clark Graebner because I first got obsessed with tennis after reading John McPhee's Levels of the Gameabout a single match between Graebner and Arthur Ashe. Graebner was the bad guy in the book, and Smith became a bad guy to me too, because he was ranked higher than Ashe, who was my hero. Ashe was playing as an amateur and didn't take money for a long time. I remember that Graebner was a CPA, which also let me think it ridiculous that a near-sighted desk-worker like my father should try to go up against Ashe, and should so nearly defeat him. I saw Smith on center court, and Graebner on a side court playing doubles. I also saw an Australian player on a side court -- not Laver or Newcombe but I think the third-seeded Australian -- Ken Elston or something?

posted by william 7:05 AM
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