Tag: Remembering

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Seashells, by Ray S

In a most quiet time I have found a treasure chest of sea shells, each one a different and radiant color.

I can reach down into their midst and pull up two handfuls with the excess falling back into a music-like pile.

Here’s the beauty and magic of each one of these shells. In something short of a century there have been or are still, a shell for each of those years, actually hundreds of little shells standing for the events of a lifetime. They are memory keepsakes, memories stored away for ever so long; some brighter than others and a number of not so bright or happy.

But like the waves washing to the shore, more shells and newly-made memories appear, to be added to our collection of a lifetime.

© 12 March 2018

About the Author

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Remembering, by Phillip Hoyle

I
remember a religious educator from years ago who sometimes surprised me with
his rather creative thoughts. (Of course, I’m still trying to recall his name; perhaps
William something.) He once asserted the main resource anyone has in education
is memory. He illustrated his perspective by the example of having boxes and
boxes, files and files of resources such as books, curriculum designs, manuals,
art supplies, costumes, play scripts, musical scores, recordings, movies, and
so forth, but if you don’t recall—that is remember—what you have put away, you
won’t be able to use them.
I
learn more and more about this perspective every day. Just last week I thought
I would wear a particular sweater, but when I opened the storage box where I
thought it was, the one under the chair in the east alcove of the bedroom, the
sweater wasn’t there. I searched the stack of sweaters I’d been wearing, the
ones I’ve been stacking in the chair next to the bed but it wasn’t there, not
even at the bottom of the stack. I looked through the stack of clothes atop the
little chest of drawers in the closet, the one where I keep my sweat shirts and
a few other items, but it wasn’t there. Then I recalled another storage box
under the bed and pulled it out. There I found three sweaters—one I didn’t even
know I owned, but none of the sweaters was the one I thought I was searching
for. I chose one of them to wear, but as I write this story I can’t recall the
sweater I originally thought I was looking for. Was it brown, red, green, or
blue? Bulky knit or smooth? Solid or patterned? Cotton or acrylic? Pullover or
cardigan? Button-up or zippered? I have no idea, no memory.
So
I conclude my friend was right. Oh I found a resource, but it wasn’t the one I
remembered. The problem I face may be one complicated by old age. In sixty five
years I’ve worn so many sweaters—ones I liked and wish I still had (of course none
would fit, but I’m not talking about that)—so many that now I’m confused enough
that I go looking for resources I know but just don’t recall what decade I had
that box, or in which church I kept those particular boxes, or now even that
there is another box of resources under the bed.
Memories.
I have floods of them and at this point sometimes feel overwhelmed by them. So
last week, when I got tired of wearing to Storytime my four sweat shirts (two
of which appear exactly alike to the casual observer) and my five sweaters (I’m
sure I wanted at least to look different than usual on Monday afternoon in case
my story seemed too much the same old thing), so I remembered a sweater I guess
I don’t even own any more, like the old guy with senile dementia who thinks I’m
his childhood lover or the old gal on pain meds who when I visited her in the
hospital introduced me to her nephew although she and I were the only ones in
the room. And I’m writing this story about memories with the earnest hope I’ll
be able to find it in my computer’s word processor when I need to print it out
and put it in my backpack with the other resources I carry to our storytellers
gathering and remember to put the backpack on my back when I leave the house,
pick it up again when I leave my office, not leave it at the restaurant, and able
to find the story when the session begins.
Of
course, should all that fail—or even if just one cog in the works be forgotten)
I could simply rely on my memory to tell this story or some other one I’ve
forgotten about until this very moment. I guess my friend was right. The real
and essential key to resources is one’s memory.
© 20 November 2012 –Denver  
About
the Author 
  

Phillip Hoyle
lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In
general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two
years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now
focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE
program “Telling Your Story.”
He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com
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Remembering by Michael King

Since I have now been writing stories based on the topic of the week for about 3 ½ years, I have had a variety of insights relating to today’s topic “remembering”. Each topic seems to force me to examine my memories regarding the particular topic. When I first started it became very painful as I had so many of my life’s experiences so deeply buried in a hidden place somewhere to never be thought about again.

My lifetime of forgetting and going ahead had worked well up until I started thinking about the topic for rhe week. Some topics brought forth a tremendous surge of past hurts and disappointments. Others gave me the opportunity to see parts of my life more clearly. It didn’t seem to matter what feeling and memories I had. What I did begin to notice was resolve. I allowed myself to sincerely assess each group of experiences that came into my mind as I pondered the possible truth of these memories. Surprisingly, I realized that for the most part I didn’t at the time have the skills or the experience to handle whatever situation in a manner that met my high standards. I had often felt that I was a failure and incompetent. Now I can see that I simply didn’t know how to meet some of these challenges with any real level of maturity as I had not yet developed any coping techniques to address most of the painful disappointments and betrayals that always surprised me and my overly sensitive ego had no calloused self-protective armor. I so much have always wanted to live in a wonderful world where I was also wonderful and efficient, respected and loved, skillful and wise, happy and humorous, brave and self-sufficient, intelligent and knowledgeable, and on and on and on.

So, I must now take responsibility for having seen the world of my past as one that of course I couldn’t be comfortable in since I didn’t have the knowledge or understanding to be the person that I thought I should be. I didn’t allow for mistakes, ignorance, self forgiveness, nor did I allow for those in my environment to be less than honorable, trustworthy, mature, etc. Not only was I a disappointment to myself, but that was often reinforced by the way others treated me. I felt alone, that I couldn’t trust anyone including myself.

This was the frame of mind I had for the first 17 years of my life; I often focused on the negative and placed little attention on the positive. Now I see that there was much that I could have appreciated that I didn’t.

I am also aware that I can now review much of my life from a much clearer perspective since I have by now finally had the experiences and developed the coping skills and insights that allow me to put all those dreadful feeling and disappointments in a more realistic and understanding perspective. Yes, if I had been in a different environment and had mentors and so on it might have been different. Then I probably wouldn’t have the insight and compassion for understanding other people.

From 17 on, my world changed when I went to college and for the first time in my memory I didn’t have to feel on the defensive. I began to be more and more like I thought I should be and feel.

I continued to have some difficult periods and many challenges, disappointments and failures which I still considered unacceptable, but I also had many really wonderful happenings and wasn’t always waiting for the other shoe to drop. There were plenty of times that it did. I was caught off guard or betrayed or deeply hurt either because of my own doing or someone else’s.

I’ve been doing a lot of self-forgiveness and a lot of forgiving since I started the “Telling My Story Group” and I realize that we rework our memories. We see them from different perspectives. We sometimes make changes in our thoughts, our behaviors, our emotional selves and we can rework our memories. We can also do as I did for years and bury them.

Some of the memories that I like best are the ones where I have been outrageous, funny and got the reactions I wanted and the times when I felt loving and loved, sensuous and sexy, accepted and appreciated, when I was admired and agreed, and when I felt secure that I was thick skinned enough to withstand anything that comes my way. Being so prepared after 73 years of being defensive seems to have eliminated being caught off guard. When I am, I almost always can turn the situation into something humorous. I love a good laugh and usually don’t wait till I’m challenged. I especially remember when something’s funny.

© 11
March 2013

About the Author  


I go by the drag name, Queen Anne Tique. My real name is Michael King. I am a gay activist who finally came out of the closet at age 70. I live with my lover, Merlyn, in downtown Denver, Colorado. I was married twice, have 3 daughters, 5 grandchildren and a great grandson. Besides volunteering at the GLBT Center and doing the SAGE activities,” Telling your Story”,” Men’s Coffee” and the “Open Art Studio”. I am active in Prime Timers and Front Rangers. I now get to do many of the activities that I had hoped to do when I retired; traveling, writing, painting, doing sculpture, cooking and drag.

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Remembering by Betsy

I can’t remember if it’s always been like this, but lately “remembering” issues are cropping up all the time. I’ll think of something I have to do and two minutes later I’ve completely forgotten it and I’m on to something else. Often I’ll list in my head a number of chores and tasks that are absolutely necessary and important to get done right away. So important that I decide that I simply MUST make a list immediately of all the items. Then within minutes I have forgotten to make the list, I have forgotten most of the chores and I’ve been completely distracted by a totally unrelated activity. When I’ve completed that activity, I can’t remember any of the other items that I was going to write on a list that I can’t remember if I have written and if I have written it I certainly can’t remember where the list is.

Having described this state of affairs, I am left scratching my head and saying, “This person lives in a state of constant confusion.” But it’s not like that really. It’s because I am very focused on what I am doing that the other things are forgotten–until I’m finished with what I’m focused on. Again I can’t remember if it’s always been like this.

They say that in our old age we forget things. But I have to wonder if it’s not just memory overload. After all an 80 year old has four times as much to remember as a twenty year old. Shouldn’t that alone make it harder to recall things

When it comes to remembering the past, I often wonder why it is that we have a clear picture in our memories of select incidences. What is it about those particular happenings that make them memorable. For me, it could be a good experience or a bad experience or a rather bland experience. But, for some reason, that memory is the one I access. For some it seems memories of the past are readily available and for others never available.

Perhaps it is a basic talent of sorts for some. I see this in my 3 children who all are of normal intelligence, but one has ready access to memories the others do not.

Then some are predisposed to remember numbers, others remember names, some remember music better than others. 

Then there is inherited memory. An all-consuming topic for the modern psychologist interested in the study of memory. On that subject: someone once suggested to me that I have a phobia for snakes because when I lived in a tree, in a past life, a snake got me. Yikes! I’m glad I don’t remember that!

Most of what I think about memory is based on observation or belief. I have very few facts. The human brain being the complicated “animal” that it is will be the enigma that it is to the lay person for many years to come–at least I believe it will.

Enough rambling about remembering. It’s time to check “write about remembering” off my list and start a new list of what to do next.

© 11 March 2013

About the Author  

Betsy has been active in the GLBT community including PFLAG, the Denver women’s chorus, OLOC (Old Lesbians Organizing for Change). She has been retired from the Human Services field for about 15 years. Since her retirement, her major activities include tennis, camping, traveling, teaching skiing as a volunteer instructor with National Sports Center for the Disabled, and learning. Betsy came out as a lesbian after 25 years of marriage. She has a close relationship with her three children and enjoys spending time with her four grandchildren. Betsy says her greatest and most meaningful enjoyment comes from sharing her life with her partner of 25 years, Gillian Edwards.

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Sandy Hook Elementary Victims (14 December 2012). Gone but Not Forgotten — by Ricky

          I hope the following photographs forever haunt the dreams of our Congress’s heartless, soulless, and cowardly elected members who voted down (or blocked) the firearms background checks bill. May they never have another peaceful night of sleep! 

In Memoriam of Sandy Hook Elementary Victims
(14 December 2012)
The Adults
Rachel D’Avino (Teacher’s Aid with her dog)
Dawn Hochsprung (Principal)

Nancy Lanza (Mother of the murderer)

Anne Marie Murphy (Teacher)

Lauren Rousseau (Teacher)

Mary Sherlach (School Psychologist)

Victoria “Vicki” Soto (Teacher)

The Children
Charlotte Bacon 6

Daniel Barden 7

Olivia Engel 6

Josephine Gay 7

Dylan Hockley 6

Madeleine F. Hsu 6

Catherine V. Hubbard 6

Chase Kowalski 6

Jesse Lewis 6

Grace McDonnell 7

Ana Marques-Greene 6

James Mattioli 6

Emillie Parker 6

Jack Pinto 6

Noah Pozner 6

Caroline Previdi 6

Jessica Rekos 6

Avielle Richman 6

Benjamin Wheeler 6

For a list of school shootings in the U.S. from 26 July 1764 through 13 December 2013 visit:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_shootings_in_the_United_States

© 29 January 2013, revised 18 March 2013, 27 April 2013, 5 May 2013, 9 November 2013, and 14 December 2013. 



About the Author

Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe, CA

Ricky was born in 1948 in downtown Los Angeles. He lived first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach both suburbs of LA. Just days prior to turning 8 years old, he was sent to live with his grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years while (unknown to him) his parents obtained a divorce.

When reunited with his mother and new stepfather, he lived one summer at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, he moved to Denver, Colorado where he lived with his wife of 27 years and their four children. His wife passed away from complications of breast cancer four days after 9-11.

He came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. He says, “I find writing these memories to be very therapeutic.”

Ricky’s story blog is “TheTahoeBoy.blogspot.com”.

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Remembering by Merlyn

I read a story on line a few years ago that made a lot of sense to me. It was about why time starts going faster as people get older. The point of the story is the fact that you only remember things that are new. When you are young everything is new, interesting and you remember everything. Days, weeks and years last forever.

As we get older we get set in our ways. Can you remember the last time you went to the store? Most of the time the memory of the trip just blends into all of the other times we made the same trip to the same store; the time is lost. We fill our lives doing the same things over and over there is hardly anything new to remember. Our lives are boring, we are boring, and life is boring.

The one point I want to make is this:

All God ever does is watch us.

He will kill us when we get boring!

Remember:

We must never ever be BORING!!!

© 30
March 2013



About the Author




I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.


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Remembering by Jon Krey

The past is the past and therefore is forgotten since it IS the past. Forgetting it well may be assisted with electro-shock therapy. I once plugged myself into an outlet thinking it was a key hole. Now I’m so very glad about forgetting… something, I can’t remember what.

Besides, when meditating, I’m supposed to “go” someplace in my mind where I was happy and life was fine. Some place by a babbling brook, in the grass, holding some stupid rock, onto which I would place all my bad memories. Trouble is I don’t remember any such place. I don’t remember anything. Maybe ’cause I plugged myself in too much thinking it was a car thingy where you stick something to make it move… uhhh. I’m not sure it was a key hole and not some other kind of hole. Then there was… uhh… uhh…. I forgot.

But what sweet remembrances; remembering all those things not remembered. All those wonderful times back when I was remembering. I remembered so many things… I think. Not sure since I don’t remember remembrances. But then I’m not sure these days. Did I put toast or something else in the toaster? Why is the water running? Why is water boiling in the oven. I found my pants in the frig after I’d already put my shirt on over my underwear which I finally found on my cat. She should know how to dress herself! But I only found my socks in the microwave. Where are my shoes? That’s silly. They belong in the bathtub. Not sure though the fire bell is ringing. Klang klang klang goes the trolley. It’s hurting my ears and they’re already ringing. Why has the fire department shown up? What pretty lights they have…. Oh I know. It’s Christmas time! I wish they’d do something about the smoke in the hall. It smells like something’s burning… besides there’s smoke in the hall… uhh… something… like when… where was that now… and… I think so clearly these days! Did you know there’s smoke in the hall? Was that today or last week? I do remember plugging something into something or someone… uhh… where there was…. Is that smoke in the hall.? Once… in nineteen ninety… or 2000 something. Oh that damned water on the floor is so messy and running somewhere and the floor is all wet and making my feet cold. Why is that? Why is the bathtub running water over on the floor? The cat litter is all in the toilet too. How can I sit on it if she’s using it? I finally found my jeans in the frig but it’s too late. I already have my shirt buckled around my waist and on my legs. I didn’t mention that. I’ll call someone… on… the… uhh…. Maybe I should get dressed now. The door is being knocked on my door. Knock, knock, knocking. Nevermore. What’s there? Oh God he is cute whoever they are and I don’t know but I’m not going out there where it’s foggy… outside. Besides he’s all yellow and there’s smoke in the hall. Liver problems. I ‘member that.

No I don’t think I’ll put on shoes. What was it again I was supposed to do? I ‘member a lot. I ‘MEMBER MOMMA. Some dismembered Mommas. Others dist… well they…. Oh what difference does it make? I dismember my socks in the microwave.

I ‘member tying my hateful cousin to railroad tracks when I was… ummmm… back when gas… was… cheaper. That’s why I can’t remember dismember.

Dismembered chicken heads! Dad was good and the dog gave him head or a head? Don’t remember that too… much Then we ate my favorite….

Now, I should remind myself to remember, but I forgot what to write I… wrote was… to… find that thing I wrote on? Where is… what I can’t remember?

All this seems so distant now whatever that… was. These yellow men are taking me away. “Ho, Ho, He, He, Ha, Ha,” to some kind of a “funny farm where life is fine.” What I don’t remember was that I should think about winding the electric clock! That’s it!
Who are you? Who are these people? I feel like I’m really tied down. Feels good. Not since…. Whoa. Whoopti-du! Off to see some wizard! There’s smoke in the hall too. Did I tell you that? Fire’s warm and bright. I like fire, do you like fire too?

Oh well it’s just a well but not too far down. Remembering things is some…. Times are good but more frequently or are just downright. I’m a frustrated romantic. Lot of good that’s done. Roman, Roaming, Romer, Romance is a word I remember like words from a thing I had sex with, I think. I kissed the wrong correct end which was good since I’d just brushed my hair….

I like clocks, do you like clocks too?
Here I sit thinking about what I was supposed to think about. Thinking is hard on me. My meds are somewhere… but where is… them. Oh, on my table. Who put them there?

Next time… I think I heard… drilling holes in my head, sticking a computer… chip in something… somewhere. It’s all perfectly clear to me now! Yes clearly perfect.

That’s it.! Whatever it was anyway. I can care less what they want.

I don’t do prose… or… cons. I don’t… forget it, I already have.

Alzheimers is a bitch and then you forget it… all. ‘Specially if you have to think really fast’n hard like… me or someone I knew once. Take vitamin C…. A little dab’ll do ya. Yeah Viagra! Someone said that… next…???????

Bye.

© 26 April 2013

About the Author


“I’m just a guy from
Tulsa (God forbid). So overlook my shortcomings, they’re an illusion.”