I went
home today and I brought back a book.
The Man Without Qualities (volume 1).
It’s one
of those big European books my mom liked to read.
Recently I
read that if you don’t keep remembering a thing—
Remembering
like exercise, like practice—
You will
forget it.
Its
qualities will become vague.
(My mom’s
high school yearbook superlative:
Vague…
vaguest….)
That can’t
possibly happen to my memories of my mother, I think.
Mother:
that distancing word. I worry: I am not exercising them enough.
I am wary
of photos, as if they will replace memories.
Especially
photos of her in her later sicker days
(Why would
you put a frame on that?)
I am wary
of memories of memories.
My secret
resource is her books
So many
she read that I have yet to read
Some she
wrote in, one she wrote
Skimming, seeing post-its, dog-ears,
Marginalia. Chapter Four:
"If there is a sense of reality, there must also be a sense of possibility"
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