Tabula Rasa—Memories
I know memories are fleeting, and age kills everything. Not that we’re permitted to lie on age and time, but at least we have leverage. Someone once told me a few years ago, "I’ll never forget about you.” I smiled. A few weeks after, they forgot all about me. Not that I am entitled. But in a way, I was disappointed in myself for thinking memories were enough. Memories are the mind’s currency. It’s the magic our mind creates when the physical or reality is gone extinct. But today, memories are so short-lived that one might assume that they never existed.
Everyone who knew me once or had some emotional intimacy with me might understand that sometimes I am quiet. Not out of lack of saying anything but from fear. Fear of what I may say might ruin the memory. You see, I take memories significant. However short they might seem, I hold them to heart and worship those I share memories with. I am cursed, I must confess. It’s a curse that I never forget anything. Even when I mess up, I try, but I can’t, and I won’t forget still. I think even till the day I die. I’ll almost still remember every single memory.
The temporality of people, a crime which I also am guilty of, is a terrible affliction. An old widower once had a dog gifted to him by his wife. She says to him on her death bed, “assume I am this dog, I know I promised you eternity, but now I have defaulted on my promise, but now I am gifting you this dog. She’ll be with you for the remainder of your life.” The older man accepted. He cared for the dog till they became inseparable. Then the man made a promise to the dog that he shall never leave her, he says, “I know that humans have a longer life span than dogs, so I’ll wait till you’re buried before I die.” But unfortunately, death came sooner for the older man. He died. The dog was alone. But before the man died, he made memories with the dog. So every day, the dog walked in their past steps and continued their rituals. The dog was never lonely. Till the day she also died.
Memories are living things, and they have a soul and a beating heart. Once you know a person and become intimate with them, your mind subconsciously creates a memory for your relationship. And that is what remains when the person isn’t with you anymore. But the million-dollar question is that can memory be killed? "Yes, it can.” Not by alcohol or drugs or even time and age. All these are just temporary fixes. The only thing that can kill a memory is simple, lose your mind. Since your mind is the creator of all memories, it’s the only one with permission to destroy them, just like how our body doesn’t need our permission to replicate and destroy cells. We don’t have the right or license to kill memories; however, desperately, we might want to—you can't destroy what you have no control over. But we have the power to turn these memories into scars that line the walls of our minds in remembrance of those we wish we had forgotten. So, we’re left with heartbreak and PTSD if we’re lucky.
On the day we die. Our eyes would be as white as snow; we would remember everything. And then we begin to fear because we can already see the soul of each of our memories coming towards us. Our body starts to shake, and then we become petrified that instant. So it begins; every memory would come to us, vividly from the moment we were born to the last day. We would not forget everything, and then we would begin to make an audit and pass judgements through those memories. One after the other, they would come till they all vanish as gradually as they came. And at that moment after, we must have purged our mind of every last memory. Our skin would grow pale and cold. Our eyes blank till our hearts stop beating. Then our mind goes back to being blank.
Tabula Rasa.