A vision in the night…

I found myself twisted up in thought last night, when I should have been sleeping, and I made an interesting personal discovery concerning the nature of memory. I was contemplating how and why specific memories seem to change over the years; how they bend and flex to the point of only resembling the truth of the moment as it was when it was experienced; and I accidentally fell through one such false memory, and into the actual memory that was behind it. This is why;

Like the whispering game, where a group of people pass a message from ear to ear in whispers to see how much it changes, each time we consciously think of a memory, that particular moment of remembering becomes a re-written copy of the original memory, a copy that is drawn upon the next time we desire to pull the memory from our filing cabinets, where we once again re-write the memory from the already re-written copy, and so on and so forth, until the memory is almost utterly indistinguishable. However, with the proper meditation and consideration, one can sometimes slash through the fakes, and reach the original . I’m not exactly sure how, as I was somewhat delirious when I did it, but I think it starts with recognizing the false memories; and attempting to recall minute details of the original experience haven’t been previously thought of, or logged, since it first happened.

One such fake memory I have is stopping at a gas station in Mackinaw in the wee hours of the morning, on my way home from Detour. The fake memory just has me in the store, reaching for a bag of peanuts, then looking at the woman behind the counter, then back behind the wheel as I speed off down the road…the real memory behind it seeped in, however, and goes something as follows:
  

I step out of the car, my thin summer shoes making light grinding noises on the dry august pavement, and a leaf rustling breeze presses into my face. I feel young, and light, and I float effortlessly towards the convenience store, which seems to be leaning slightly to the right, underneath a splash of white light. The air blows warm, but dry, and it smells like deep water and sun burnt grass. The land sleeps, but I feel thoroughly empowered with my situation; my eventual destination is warm and exciting, and a tense orgasmic sensation tingles in my chest. I can hear the car door closing behind me; a distant echo. Above, the stars vibrate and gleam, spinning the world into an odd sort of vertigo as I gaze at them…somewhere among the crickets, the sound of a car fades as it drives away….