We'll see

 How old does something have to be to become a memory? The obvious and easy answer is, just a minute or two. But that isn't the memories I'm thinking about. I'm thinking about older memories, but how old? Weeks, months, years? Was a day when a week seemed like an awful long time. Remember waiting for Christmas or your birthday, how long that was. Remember when Mom or Dad would say, we'll see. It took forever for them to see and sometimes they never saw at all. Then somewhere along the way the weeks and months just all blend together and a year goes by. I'm at the point where I'm counting decades. It's like being young again, in the interest of brevity, I'm counting by tens! 

 It's beginning to seem to me like a memory has to be ten years old to qualify. That thought came to me as I looked at my "memories" page on Facebook. I usually click on that each morning to see what I was talking about last year and the years before. This morning I saw where I had gone on vacation to Sedona Arizona nine years ago. Doesn't seem like it was that long ago. Yesterday I went to tend the grave of my daughters in laws father and there is a red rock from Sedona on that stone. Been there nine years already, he's been there ten. I also saw a photograph of my granddaughter, in her dance outfit, when she was eleven. How cute she was and now she is twenty one, all grown up on the outside and still that little girl to me. I remember when that happened with my own children too, happens awful fast. All just a memory now.

 How long does it take before you will talk about things of the past. That is to say the things that are perhaps unpleasant or less than flattering. My grandmother would say never speak ill of the dead. I don't recall her saying much about the living other than, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. I did notice there were times when even she didn't follow that advice. But it was usually when the event being described, being remembered, wouldn't cause any harm. That was because either the person/event being talked about had already admitted to being wrong or apologetic. Then it was alright to bring that stuff up. 

 It happens when you reach a degree of objectivity. That's my thought anyway. It takes a different length of time to reach that in each instance. Those closest to you taking the longest time and those on the other end of that spectrum the least. By the least I mean, right now, immediately. Then the quest becomes, forget about it! Turns out forgetting isn't as easy as remembering. That's just another of those ironic little things in life. Just another reason I think God has a sense of humor. He already has that sense of objectivity that we all strive to achieve, or should try to achieve anyway. Our memories should become like a well worn pair of shoes, comfortable. And like shoes it takes time and distance to get that level of comfort. That coupled with the ability to place yourself outside of the memory. When you can view those memories like a slide show it's time to share them. And yes, sometimes those memories will be received the same as those proverbial home movies we have all heard about. Do people share vacation videos these days? I don't think so, just post them on social media platforms. 

 I remember and a memory. They are different things altogether. Remembering is reliving something, memory is enjoying it. You can remember yesterday or the day before but that doesn't mean you want to relive it, but you really don' have a choice. You will, for a while anyway. Memories, memories are something you find that was never lost. Something you embrace, something you want to share. Memories are an attachment. Memory is a permeance. It's my thinking that even those with Alzheimer's disease, or some other form of memory loss, don't really lose those memories, they just lose the ability to share them. 

 It's something that we will never know for certain. It hurts us a whole lot more than it hurts them is my thought. But I have no experience working with those folks either so it may be nothing more than a comforting thought on my part. How long do we remember? Do we remember beyond death? Well, that's the prevailing thought isn't it, that we do. We believe all those we loved and cared about are waiting for us. We are looking forward to a reunion. The only way that can happen is if we remember. Can't have a reunion with strangers can you. Memories are what we take to the reunion. Is there a last one? Hmm, as Mom or Dad might have said, we'll see.