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, January 03, 2011

I remember going to visit Floyd and Lynn and Jesse and Sarah every February vacation. Another way to say this: I remember going to the Smithsonian Museums. I remember the Air & Space Museum. Because it was the place my brother felt most at home and happy, we went there often. But I also remember the zoo and the natural history museum and and the botanical gardens (though they are not Smithsonian) and hours on the Mall and art, art, art. I remember when Jesse and Yossi and I were old enough to be able to visit galleries on our own: We synchronized our watches with my parents, agreed on a meeting place, and set a time to return to it. I remember going to what must have been the Hirshhorn: We walked around and talked about the works by ourselves. I don't remember anything we saw that day except a large, grey Henry Moore that I liked, but I remember the satisfaction of recognizing the artwork, the conviction that the works were my particular friends, just as Jesse was, even if we saw each other only once a year. Walking those galleries released me from being poor, being uncool, being 13, being awkward, and deep, and ugly. Artwork does not love you less for any of these reasons, and neither did Jesse.

posted by Rosasharn 4:04 PM
. . . 1 comments
Comments:
Such great memories ... thank you for them!

# posted by Jesse W. : 7:58 AM

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