What is the relation between aging and memory? What is the relation between introversion and the suppressed material we bottle up? How does this suppressed material relate to what we remember? OK. This already got too heady. My blogging fears are realized.
There's clearly no correlation between how memory evolves as we (in a universal sense) get older. Personally, I've found that my memories are intimately filtered through music, film and literature. I can remember the days and nights of almost every movie I've seen at a theater. Yet more than the plots, I recall who was there, what we did before and after, and even particular opinions about a film. I'll never forget the day we saw Jurassic Park III, and it has nothing to do with the movie. My friend Kim loved it (which is ridiculous), but this made her all the more sweet and adorable that day. We were in a parking lot at El Con mall. It was sunny and hot. The older I get, the more days like this I remember.
Music might play an even bigger role for me. I remember what I listened to while driving on road trips all over the southwest. I remember how I listened to a Clipse album with my friend Jason for the first time as he put together a set of wooden chairs. In a sense, every night we sat in those wooden chairs and talked shop was a direct relation to that memory. I filtered a series of people, conversations and objects through a rap album that has nothing at all to do with where things went.
Music also creates involuntary memories for me. It can trigger a boulder at the peak of Muir Woods as I shared a sandwich with my sister, or the feeling of walking up to a door in the rain during my first day as a professional.
On the question of how introversion and suppression relates to our memories, I find myself coming back to this video project where Bush's daily photos are viewed and morphed over the course of 31 months. His aging is apparent. His souring attitude is apparent. Yet most interestingly, the rapid aging might be the culmination of having to suppress his real feelings, outlooks and personality through time. All memories are bottled up. I'm sure as the President you don't remember everything, but internal haunting can sure cause some wrinkles.
Finally, how does suppression relate to what we remember? Recluses, writers, drifters, librarians, the depressed and security guards spend a lot of time alone. I wonder if they internalize so many memories and thoughts that it becomes too much. The past must weigh this group down much of the time. Those that constantly discuss memories and open their lives like books often isolate very particular moments that they emphasize again and again. Talk to any senior citizen that loves to talk. They will inevitably have 9 or 10 memories that they return to over and over again. Talk to any senior citizen that doesn't talk. They just might look haunted.
