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, April 09, 2006

I remember watching motes in the sunlight. It was of course easier to do this if you were lying on the rug, so that you both felt the dust in your throat (from the rug), and saw it in the light. I remember liking the motes, but being surprised that the world was so dusty. I was glad it was though: it made it obvious that there wasn't the big difference my elders were always trying to impress on me between being clean and being dirty. I remember later, being bored at P.S. 166, especially during assembly, but watching the motes in the sunlight that peaked through the heavy drawn curtains sometimes.

Later still I gave a guessing game speech in sixth grade, where you think of something, describe it periphrastically and try to stump the class while answering yes or no questions. I thought of dust. Yes, it was on other planets. No one got it. When I revealed the answer, Mr. Richards shook his head in disappointment that they hadn't gotten it. He had, immediately, because the only thing we know is on other planets, all other planets, was dust. I was very impressed with him, and retain this as an interesting fact still, and impressed with myself for falteringly but correctly saying yes when they asked whether there was dust on other planets, even on the moon.

posted by william 5:59 PM
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