Memorial Day

   Today is Memorial Day for all the soldiers who gave their lives for the United States. May they rest in peace. Today would have been my brother's birthday so for me its a different kind of memorial day and somewhat ironic. Its been six months since my youngest brother passed away. I still miss him very much, but the reality has more than set in. Life has moved on. I feel like taking time out to remember him helps keep him alive.
     My youngest brother was a creative person. He had eclectic taste and would have made a wonderful dad or uncle. He was fun to be around and had great life hacks. I always think of him when I travel because he was the king of packing light. He lived a short  but good life and he tried to live life to its fullest which is all anyone can do. No one really knows how long one has but we have more control over our attitude and how we try to spend our lives.
     My youngest brother was a ray of sunshine on this earth. Ray was his middle name and I think that its quite appropriate because he was a ray of sunshine when he was alive and his memory brings a ray of sunshine to those who knew and loved him. 

On Alzheimers

     Alzheimer's is  a horrible disease. I suppose the only good part is that they can forget a lot of life's awkward moments that most of us without Alzheimer's would like to be able to remove from our consciousness.
      The other day I met someone whose mother unfortunately has Alzheimer's and is eating too much because she forgets how much she has eaten and just keeps eating. That was something that I had never considered. 

gone but not really

 when someone close passes on it is upsetting because they are no longer alive. you can't speak to them anymore. you can't spend time with them anymore. oddly as final as death is what no one ever manages to tell you is that though they are no longer with us physically they are still alive and well in your thoughts. their  memory lives on in your memories. in a way they are no longer themselves as they are a part of you.
my paternal grandparents passed twenty years ago. it doesn't seem that long ago i know they are gone, but i still feel their presence.. my maternal grandmother passed away almost ten years ago. it took me a long time to get over her passing. she was such a strong force of  life. i missed her laugh and the love only a grandparent can impart. my dad passed away a year and a half ago. i don't know where the time has gone. so many memories. so much left unsaid. i have learned that even though someone has passed one still has time to re-examine one's relationship with them. though it may have been better to have done this when the person was still alive its better late than never. they still live on in your brain so you best try to sort things out.
people only pass away physically.

old pictures

when i look at old family photos i imagine what it would be like to jump into the pictures and relive those captured moments. i imagine the love i would feel immersed with long gone relatives. as much as i wish i could jump back into those moments  i also know that once loved ones have passed on they continue living within you and within your memories. its hard to explain if you have never experienced it. for better or for worse i have. they have left this earth. or so you think. there essense continues to live via what you have learned from them and what you remember of them.

memories

i have a freakishly good recall  for names , places and memories. it can be a blessing and a curse. its great to remember good things, not so great to remember the not so good moments of life.
i don't know if it it would be better to have a poor memory but since i am used to having a good sense of memory i don't think that i would like not being able to remember things .
the weird  thing about having a good memory is that people think that i pay more attention to names and faces than i really do. its not that im trying extra hard to remember people's names  i just happen to remember them.
a lot of people think that i am more of a tv watcher than i am because i remember many celebrity names. i watch a lot of movies but not much tv , its just that i remember those celebrities  that i like.
i remember a lot of trivial moments in my friends' lives that sometimes they jog my memory for things that they want to remember about themselves.
id like to forget more about relationships that i have had that have not gone well, but alas i remember them all too well.

time heals

im visiting the midwest and my mother for the labor day/rosh hashana festivities that are upon us. its been five months since my dad passed away. now it seems like its been a long time. right after he passed it seemed more surreal than real. now it just seems real. it also is much easier to internalize. ive already had months to get used to it.  it actually seems like even longer since i have spent time with my father as himself as opposed to his pre-death self. that was actually a year ago  labor day when i visited my parents.
the pain following my father's death was so brutal that its good that it has dissipated. time to remember the good times. the passage of time really compels one to to do so.you begin to forget the pain of the death scene and  replace it with memories of the deceased as they were when they were alive.

family dinners

one of my fondest memories growing up was of my family eating dinner together. we weren't formal and they weren't prolific. i cant even remember what kind of conversations we had. i just remember that they were nice. they ended a long time ago. they ended when i went to high school and got home later than my other siblings. they would eat before i got home and i would eat by myself. i guess i must have eaten with my mom because she must have served me.

once i was in high school family dinners were just on shabbos. it wasn't the same as when it had been an everyday event, but they were still in effect .

once i graduated high school it was all over. i spent a year in israel and then i emigrated to new york.

time marches on and you barely have time to remember the details of childhood and then one day you do and you realize not only they are gone but they are long gone. they are just a glimmer in your mind's eye.

the not so good old days....

i recently came across a facebook group from one of the summer camps i attended . when i saw the photos it struck me just how very young my fellow campers and i were. even the counselors looked like babies. the jappy girls looked so angelic. they also looked too young to have been so cliquish . in the photos some of the rowdy boys appeared just as wiley as they did when i knew them years ago. it was nice to view those photos in the safe distance of memory. i did not like that camp much. it seems like such a lifetime ago. its almost hard to believe that i was that young even though i recall it so vividly. the good thing about looking back is that it will always be the past.

window into the past

elderly people who are still all there are the coolest people to spend time with. when you look around their living space you see ancient photos that seem current to them and furniture that to a younger person only exist in the movies or a thrift shop. you also get a window into the past. history books cant give you what an elderly person can. a book can tell the facts and even about how people may have been effected by these facts, but a book can only be read. you can ask an elderly person questions . they may not always remember, but when they do its amazing.

years ago when my great uncle was still alive he told me about how when he was small there were only horse and buggies. he also said that there used to be a stone in front of homes and stores . there was a large gap between the ground and the carriage. the men could easily jump down , but the women in their dresses could not do so gracefully . this is where the stone comes in. the women would step onto the stone and then onto the ground. it was much more graceful this way. he also said that years after horse and buggies were just a memory these stones remained. after awhile people didnt even remember why they were there in the first place.

after cars were invented one always knew when it was a good year economically when one looked in the driveway at the university and there were many cars parked there. (this of course was outside of new york. )

my great uncle also described the thrill of riding on a train for the first time. there werent even any seats, but for him it was just so exciting to travel city to city in such a modern mode of transportation.

my great uncle also lived years before window screens were invented. he said it was awful when one rode on a bus. all the bugs would fly in your face. not a great visual indeed. it was something i had never thought of . i thought window screens had been around forever. who knew?

i could have read all about these events in a book, but these facts on their own may not have actually interested me. knowing someone who had experienced such events made them seem less of a fairytale and more plausible. my great uncle not only knew about these things, he lived them.

there are so many nuggets elderly people carry within them. we must help them pass them on to us before they arent able to pass them on anymore.

thanks for the memories

having a good memory can be a blessing as well as a curse. i clearly recall my great-aunt who died when i was three, the score i got on my road test for my driver's license, eating popsicles at the end of the day at day camp and my first day at sleep away camp . i also remember having my wisdom teeth removed , being teased at overnight camp, and being brought to tears by those who i thought were friends. memory doesnt distinguish between positve or negative, it just remembers.

those who dont remember names also dont remember those who dont deserve to be remembered .

at work my supervisor is intimidated by me because of my memory. she of course is practically brain dead and has the memory capacity of a wood chip. i remember clients names and simple details . id rather it this way than the other way around, but i always try to downplay my ability.

im an encyclopedia when it comes to recalling men ive dated or met and trivia about them. the beauty is that im not trying to remember i just do.

people think that i read people magazine because i am up on celebrity info. i do not . who has the time? i just happen to recall details that interest me.

most who have poor memory abilities dont realize what they lack. i am grateful to recall what most may not, but for those of you who wont remember this post past five minutes from now, realize when you dont recall a pleasant detail it also means you dont recall a dreadful one.

more facebook fun

lately my old college friends have reconnected via facebook. the only awkward part is when my friends have posted some of those gawky unflattering college photos which i would prefer to have been lost perhaps in a dumpster in zimbabwe. alas... no such luck. after blasting my friends for posting such embarrassments, i figured id exact my revenge . i posted my own fleet of college photos. once again the joke was on me. several of the old gang have had kids and have gotten fat and wrinkled and wish they looked as they had at 20. i on the other hand look much better now than i had at 20. i guess the only revenge i can wield is posting current photos of myself!!!