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, February 13, 2011

I remember my counselor Julie changing the lyrics to "Ah-ban-ee-bee-oh-boh-eh-beh," which was one of the first songs we learned the steps to in Israeli dance. She sang, "I want to be a polar bear: I want to be a polar bear when I grow up"--and then she would add, under her breath, "As long as Greg is." I loved her sass and her uncool (to us) music (CSNY), her big-hippie style and the fact that she was in love with Greg. I stayed up late to confide in her. She left camp halfway through the summer, sent home for smoking pot.

posted by Rosasharn 9:38 PM
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