The awful truth of memory is that the more important, more cherished, a memory is…the quicker it’s faded or distorted. Each time we recall a memory it’s like pulling it from an old school platter drive. Erasing it completely until we save it again. Over and over, each time wearing away the section and introducing distortions until the original memory is lost. Until all you have is the memory of the memory and a description you tell yourself while recalling it. Or maybe only writers do that, I don’t know.
My memories take a long time to fade. Mainly because I try to only access the description of the memory and not the full blown sensory experience. But some important people, they’ve faded almost completely. A worn out picture. A novel read and reread so much that the paper can no longer hold ink. Trying to recall them and all I have is flashes and vague gauze, which even now tatters and fades.
I understand pictures now. But still, what the camera sees and what my mind saw, will never be the same.
Pelgris 