The nature of memory

"Days in the past cover up little by little those that preceded them and are themselves buried beneath those that follow them. But each past day has remained deposited in us, as, in a vast library in which there are older books, a volume which, doubtless, nobody will ever ask to see."
-Marcel Proust

Being sixteen is a funny thing. That's the age when you still think epiphanies are real, the age before you've had enough of them to know better. For instance, when I was sixteen, I, Matt Pearce, attained nirvana. I was right in the middle of a shower at camp one summer when all of a sudden a overwhelming tranquility washed over me. I felt benevolent and all-knowing. I knew I would never be sad again.

(Ha.)

Years later, I'd be sitting in a creative writing class with one of my teachers talking about a story he thought was sort of trite: "You ever have one of those friends who, every four months, comes up to you and is like, 'Omigosh, I just had this amazing realization!' ...Yeah! Aren't they always wrong?" It's true. Epiphanies change nothing, usually; it's a bit like hitting jackpot in the emotional lottery and losing the winnings in six months. God knows how many endorphins you trick your brain into giving itself. I imagine that, scientifically, a brain on an epiphany looks like a brain on crack.

Well, I was on emotional crack when I was sixteen, and it all happened because of a book. I remember the couch I was on when I read it. I remember what the weather was like when I read it. (Something similar would happen three years later when I read A Hundred Years of Solitude.) I remember it was a Sunday, and I remember I'd just plowed straight through the whole book in a couple hours. It was a beat-up paperback with a blue cover and a trippy picture of a Buddha statue on the cover. After I finished it, I took a deep breath. I then went to my room, and then to my shower. I had my epiphany. I got out of shower. I dressed myself with a newfound sense of wonder for everything in the world, for every moment, for every gesture of basic living like, say, tying my shoes. I was all-embracing. I walked downstairs and outside to where a poolside barbecue was being held.

The sky was blue, and resplendent.

I stood in line to get my food. Kids my age were playing water polo in the pool. I remember the smell of the chlorine and the barbecue sauce. I remember the kid standing behind me in line had blue hair and glasses and wasn't wearing shoes. I'd seen him around before but had never talked to him.

"I just read this amazing, incredible book," I said to him.

"Oh really?" he said. He had a kind voice. "What's it called?"

"It's..." and I froze. The kids played in the water. The ribs sizzled on the grill. The clouds floated across the endless sky like galleons coasting in the trade winds of the Atlantic. The kid looked at me and I looked down at his naked, flattened toes. "I, er, can't remember what it's called," I said.