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

Friday, December 01, 2006

I remember when relatives used to visit us in Brookline and in Sharon, I'd pretend I was asleep as they got up early to return to New York. I couldn't bear the thought of watching the car pull away, saying goodbye, even when I knew I'd see them a few weeks later. I'd hear my parents say "she's still asleep" and felt guilty but also felt like I'd done a good job fooling them. Now I can't picture saying hello, though these are different relatives (the parents and uncles and aunts of the NY crowd). Saying hello: I've been calling Israel a lot this past week, preparing a huge trip in less than 2 weeks. It's so strange to talk to my family. It's a pretty emotional experience, because the last time I saw some of them (Feb 2005), the ones I'm closest with, I didn't expect to be spending time together ever again on account of various illnesses, and here we are, about to reunite, talking about such mundane things: train stations, sleeping arrangements, timetables, and traffic.

posted by jennylewin 10:54 AM
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