Distant Memories
Most people are not so good at memorizing little things. They tend to have blurred visions of their own experiences — like walking along a park to find that famous art installation — but you only remember the art, not the trees, the lakes, the ducks, and the people around you.
I think our brain works curatively in terms of keeping memories — which is the antithesis of what makes a computer work, the Random Access Memories; although it can also be said, that our brain randomly chooses the memories they deem important. This is the reason why we keep forgetting where we put our keys, our old and unused watches, our social media password — all petty things that our subconscious deemed unimportant — but we always remember our first kiss, our prom night, our college graduation, our farewell parties, our first paycheck, and as bitter as to how our brain curatively choose, our first heartbreak, our first mourning for a loved one, our biggest failures.
All of those are like that art installation in the middle of the park. You forgot who congratulates you on your graduation, you forgot what food did you eat that day on your first kiss, you forgot where did you buy your coffee before taking a job interview that you eventually nailed. All those distant memories, do we really forgot about them, like how Random Access Memories works?
If distant memories are truly permanently deleted, why do we have fragments? Why do we remember some parts, that even we cannot comprehend why do we keep them? It’s some sort of this anomaly on how our brain works — we always remember the first time we fall in love, but we also remember something random from any part of our life?
I do have one distant memory, and it’s a bit peculiar. I remember sitting on a couch, in a room, a spacious one, where there’s a lot of people — so I presume that I was at someone’s party. I had nothing to do, nothing at all, because I was still a kid. I think my parents were meeting someone in this big house or convention hall, and I was left alone because back in the days, I am easily bored — and extremely shy. But back then I was pretty independent, and already scared of strangers, so my parents leaving me all alone was nothing sort of dangerous.
In that room, people are talking — some of them are smoking cigarettes while talking gibberish. Funny, back then and even now as an adult, those people at parties who talk to each other, I still hear the same gibberish — all of them are mostly white noises, a ridiculous tête-à-tête — but one thing in that room stuck with me, where this is the centerpiece of my memory.
There was a big TV in that room, hanging from one of the pillars. I think the TV was there just to be some sort of white noise for the guests, so nobody really pays any attention — but as there’s this one kid who’s extremely bored as hell, the TV was the only thing that’s interesting.
I remember the white noise that they chose was to put MTV — hence no need for speakers and individual MP3 players, just use the music that they put. Back then, MTV was all about music videos — there were also some animated cartoons like Beavis and Butthead, and also the stop motion, Celebrity Deathmatch which was legendary — but mostly MTV runs the music station TV for the whole world.
That art installation in the middle of the park, my center of memory — is the music video of Welcome to The Black Parade by My Chemical Romance. I was still a kid — I believe it was 2007 — and so I was 11. I don’t understand why the band put on white makeup, made a parade out of a dark and grim festival; but the music was at that time, energetic and fun. My Chemical Romance was the biggest name in pop-rock back then, and everyone was just putting their songs on repeat. And me, as a kid, watching that music video, felt — somewhat uneasy, but I have nowhere else to go. The music video was pretty scary, and I can’t go anywhere; so back then, I had to watch the whole video till the end — which was pretty cool, because that song will literally accompany me throughout my teenage years — but back then as a kid, it was such a peculiar experience. I was never really afraid of Gerard Way, but his white hair and wide eyes with the help of some eye shadow were pretty frightening. Yeah, that’s how I remember him back then. A very scary white-haired dude who screams and sings practically about death.
Amazing. I am so amazed at how I can remember the details of this certain memory, that out of all the amazing experiences I’ve had when I was a kid — like my birthday parties, my first time getting a PS2, my first time having a sleepover at my friend’s house — I remember the unsettling moment where I have to face the early MCR.
Lest I have to extract any takeaways from this realization, is that even we cannot understand fully how our minds work. But there’s beauty that lies behind the unknown. That is what drove some people forward: explorers travel to uncharted lands hoping to bring back golds and ivory, scientist experiments to shed light on the darkness, and poets exploit the unknown to make amazing stories. After all, at this exact time, we are exploiting how weird my mind works on memories.
