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 21, 2004

I remember that when I used to feed Powell (sometimes using the wall can-opener), I would try to shake his food out so that I wouldn't have to wash the spoon dedicated to that task. It was stainless steel with a textured handle. I hated washing it. The best food for shaking out was Alpo's chunks, usually horsemeat chunks. (And Powell sometimes bit the legs of the Sterns' horses, though I doubt he made the connection.) I found it disgusting to contemplate ever eating with that spoon, even washed. I think my parents still have it though, and do eat with it. I would also have to wash Powell's dish when he was done, which I hated. I preferred it when he licked the dish clean, so that it looked washed. But my mother would often check, either seeing gobs of that white dog-food fat on the dish, or feeling it with her fingers. I think I hated the idea of using anything to wipe the dish down, since now that thing -- paper towel, steel wool, sponge -- would get yucchy too.

posted by william 11:51 PM
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