Memory As Medicine
It was getting rather late and a fine mist was falling as I zipped along down a famous Southern street on my way home from my knitting group, The Whiskey Knitters. (Never fear, knitting was all I did.) Just ahead on the left, I could see the art museum sitting up on the hill like an ivory treasure chest, silently soaking up the glow of its spotlights, its doors now locked up tight, its great works in repose till morning. Across its wide stone face stretched a banner advertising the new exhibition by artist Radcliffe Bailey, the title of which was “Memory As Medicine”, and though I was not drunk on whiskey, I did find these words intoxicating. They kept my mind buzzing all the way back home.
Memory as medicine. How marvelous. As someone who yammers on about the importance of creating wonderful memories, these three words were like catnip. For when one’s circumstances or surroundings lack the spiritual nourishment necessary for an unfettered mind and a happy heart, sweet memories can be sublime places of mental retreat. Good, good medicine indeed.
Dotted through my home are little reminders of wonderful hours that to a visitor’s eye might seem utterly unremarkable. To me, however, each one serves as a magical talisman capable of whisking me off to other places, other days, by the mere fact of its presence. See that tiny stone? The one the colour of a thundercloud, shaped like the newest moon? It was brought back to me from Tintagel by a delightful friend the year before he died. I keep it lying atop a stack of books on Arthurian legend and each time I hold it in my hand I hear the faint sound of sea wind rushing through Merlin’s cave; I see my friend grinning at me from the hilltop above. The gothic painting over the baby grand? I purchased that with my earnings from the only song The Songwriter and I ever wrote together. If it catches my eye when I enter the room, I am immediately transported to the afternoon we spent throwing lines back and forth, laughing like kids. That tiny conch shell was picked up on Edward’s first trip to the beach. That painted mirror was once hanging in a microscopic antique shop on a Paris side street - I carried it all over Europe in my luggage, wrapped up in sweaters and shawls - years ago.
And the photograph at the top of this post is one I keep hanging in my kitchen. Not the greatest picture ever taken, I realize. The composition is not particularly good. I am caught in mid-sentence, my cheeks flushed from a very long hike up a very long hill. So why is it special? Because if memory is medicine, this photograph is, for me, the healthiest elixir imaginable, for it represents one of the most perfect days of my life. A heavenly blue sky of a day, one in which every single second, from dawn until midnight, was one I could happily stay in forever. Come with me and I’ll show you just a little of what that day was like...
An early morning spent writing, always good....
A walk around a lake....
A hike in the hills....
Approaching a storybook house....
At the gate of a storybook garden....
Is that Peter over there?.....
Seconds after this photo was taken, came a thundering sound over the hill to my left as a black and white sheepdog herded his flock directly across our path, close enough to touch....
And I sat for quite a while drinking in this view from an tiny building where the great poet himself once wrote.
We share the same birthday.
I almost heard him whisper....
I could go on and on, but I know how boring it can be to wander around in the memories of others. That is the most wondrous thing about memory, I suppose. It is good medicine tailored specifically to the patient. My memories are not yours. Yours are not mine. But they all can serve as balms to bad days, antidotes to the disarray of modern life.
Take some time out and visit some of your own best memories.
See how much better you feel.
Oh yes, and if Edward could choose his favourite memory?
No doubt he would pick the day we brought his best friend Apple home to stay.
Just look at that smile on his face!
(We should have realized how big she would get by those paws.)
