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, August 31, 2004

I remember when Ford (I think! but it might have been Chrysler) introduced ignition keys that were symmetrical so that you didn't have to figure out which was the top. The commercials announced them with much fanfare, appropriate it seemed and seems to me. I think this was before ignition keys were put into the steering column, locking the wheel. They used to be in the dashboard, which I guess made it easier to hotwire a car and drive it away.

posted by william 9:22 PM
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