There are so many things I thought I’d remember forever. Moments of romance or trauma. Teacher’s names, things they said to me. Faces. Even ones I’ve only seen once.
I used to remember everything. I loved this line from Allegra Maud Goldman – it went, “I have a terrible memory. I remember everything.” I identified with that. But I’ve discovered that when I go to retrieve details of a memory, if I go to tell a story from my past, for example, the details are gone. I’ve chunked the idea of the memory but I can’t quite place the order of events or the names or the people.