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

Tuesday, February 24, 2004

I remember when we were tested for our athletic ability at the 92nd Street Y. Was it Bill-Dave doing it? I tried to climb the knotted rope but didn't get very far. One kid touched the ceiling. And I was awful at chin-ups. But otherwise I think I was ok: sit-ups and push-ups and other activities you could cheat on. I think that my inability to do chin-ups was somewhat shocking to me. There was something the human body could do -- other kids were doing them -- that mine just couldn't. It wasn't a question of fear or technique, like rope-climbing or no-parking sign shimmying. It was just impossible. Without knowing it, perhaps, this was my first experience of what aging would be like: not being able to do what nevertheless I know can be done.

posted by william 7:27 PM
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