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, May 10, 2020
I remember Lucy telling Linus, "You'll see. Ask her [grandmother?] and she'll say 'Everyday is children's day." Then Linus talks to someone off-frame: "Why is there a Mothers' Day and a Fathers' Day but no children's day?" And in one of the rare strips when an adult speaks, the speech balloon pointing out of the frame: "Every day is children's day."  I didn't think it was true, but I kind of liked that they had a grandmother [?] they knew and whose characteristics they could rely on, just as I could.


posted by William 11:40 AM
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Saturday, May 02, 2020
I remember that radios were supposed to be better if they had more tubes, and then later if they had more transistors, and watches were supposed to be better if they had more jewels.


posted by William 7:47 PM
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