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

Sunday, September 15, 2002

I remember Dyno label makers. They still have them. I remember that you cut the embossed plastic strip off by turning the wheel not to a letter but to a little scissors icon, and pressing then. The machine looked like the Starship Enterprise.

I remember being surprised in a Peanuts cartoon at the phrase "a scissors." How could the word be singular? Would you say "a pants?" But I tried it on for size and now I sometimes say it. It feels naturalized but not natural. But it also doesn't feel natural anymore to ask for "some scissors." I always look to some fence-sitting formulation like "the scissors." But I think I do ask "Where are the scissors?" not "Where is....?"

posted by william 1:07 AM
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