Memories

“What peaceful hours I once enjoy'd! How sweet their memory still! But they have left an aching void which the world can never fill. “

Memory is the greatest of artists or rather the Greatest. The charm, one might say the genius of memory, is that it is choosy, chancy, and temperamental. It rejects the edifying pedantic stuff, needed at the most crucial junctures, and indelibly photographs moments that you can cherish for your life-long. Memories rise from several reminiscent things from the present and takes oneself to the past inducing euphoria at times and melancholy at the others.

However I genuinely believe that having a good memory has more demerits than merits. A retentive memory may be a good thing, but the ability to forget is the true token of greatness. While I was back in the US for my Summer Internship, I often had nostalgic memories of my Hostel Life, enjoying with friends and hanging out with them, and this constantly kept me slightly occupied with the idea that I wasn’t having the best possible time of my life. For every good time I had there, the reminiscence took me back to the closest time I had with my friends and hence, I had a feeling of incompleteness in the moment. “Missing people” and “the idea of good and bad times”, all arise from memories and during my stay away from my friends, I had a pretty good assessment of what changes Memories can coerce in one’s life and restrict one from having a 'blast'.

Now back here in India, where I am with my friends hanging out and having a ‘blast’, I now miss the moments I spend in the US. I often think of those times when I met new people, shared thoughts mutually and hence, procured bonds, pretty unknowingly over a period of time. I miss those moments of being bored too, which then were a pain in the ass, now surprisingly appearing as ‘good times’. I miss those times of hesitations, traveling, cooking, gallivanting around recklessly, working at odd hours, playing and every activity done.

More often that not, these memories make you fell like missing something rather than possessing something. Even with a myriad of snapshots of the past, you miss hell of a lot. I, in my desultory thoughts, wish my memory to fade. At least being a cripple would make me someone who doesn’t miss being anywhere else but let me live my life to the so-called 'fullest'.