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


Friday, June 23, 2006
I remember jellybean-counting contests. Were there that many of them? What were they all about? When submitting my name and guess and phone number, I envisioned myself at home, weeks or months later, receiving the call that told me that I'd won. Then, after leaving the store or restaurant or wherever, I'd forget all about it.


posted by jennylewin 9:26 PM
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