Memory

A famous author ( Reading Lolita in Tehran) notes she became obsessed with her parents photographs shortly after they died. She even studied them with a magnifying glass. I have also just finished reading an interesting biography. It made me think about the letters, diaries and papers we leave behind. Some in my extended family keep journals, perhaps for their descendants and maybe for self therapy. Ive never been able to keep one going for more than a few days. Maybe I loose interest in what I have to say. But in thinking about what I might end up leaving behind, I speculate, what would anyone want to know about me? I have no direct descendants. I have a lovely step daughter who will likely be much more occupied with her own children. I have extended family who will also be much more interested in their inner family works.And yet, in my family tree I have researched a woman who had no children of her own but took care of several nieces and nephews and her mother. She seems like the matriarch of her family. She left behind no known letters. I do wonder what she cared about. What she longed for. What she thought regarding her political times. She lived very near the Morman site of Navoo. Her neighborhood was the site for some atrocities. The Civil War swept through her state. Did she have time to read. Did she hate beets? Another woman's story I recently read about (Bold Spirit) survived not because of what she left behind (her children burned her memoir out of misguided anger)but because her later descendants were trying to remember her and find out about her.
I find it a touch sad too that we think we know one another. And maybe we do. Our foibles are so exposed in close contact. Bad habits , we can be kinder about with the distance of time and lost immediacy.
So, for future great grand neices et al: I hate beets, because they are purple and slimy. I love sweets because they are buttery. I like books because I can go somewhere else and gain insight. I like historical things for the same reason. I like old furniture because the wood echoes some sentiment from the tree where it once grew and the persons who might have occupied it some rainy afternoon. I dont like mechanical things as they seem so cold, although I value their function and the ease they bring to my life. Im interested in politics because of people and ideas not so much for the need to bend peoples will. I find it irritating that people cant debate earnestly without resorting to rhetoric that they really havent explored. I see great sadness in the waste of life to pursue material things, though we all like them. I toss about the idea frequently that we all are off the track, when we arent using whatever talents we may have toward the benefit of all....thought I cant figure out how we must turn to that and leave our self (ego) aside. I like mashed potatoes. I like sunflowers. I like rivers and walking on the beach. I like thinking about all my relatives growing up and becoming "someone". I like cats.