Discovering your Loss
Imagine yourself in sixty years, when
your hair is grey and thinning and your skin resembles wrinkled leather. Sure you may not catch the
eyes of people on the streets, or get told you are the pinnacle of beauty, but
at least you lived a
wonderful life. You were adventurous, talented, beautiful, smart, funny, and
dare I say, happy. Yes, you were happy, you are happy. You have your memories.
You know for a fact that your favorite smells
in the world are peaches and the musky, thick smell of burning leaves. You love
the sweet, tartness of your mothers refreshing Orange Julius mixed with the
salty, buttery taste of your dads’ famous popcorn. You can remember your sister
and yourself building forts in the living room out of soft couch cushions, or
fending off the monstrous dogs outside who seemed to run at the speed of a
bullet.
You lived a life of kings although
you did not have gold or servants, but you had riches of a different kind. You
had friends and family to take care of you and love you throughout your
lifetime. You made countless memories with them and laughed until you cried.
Now that you have that picture, I want you to imagine something else, something
darker. Forgetting.
Imagine what it would be like to go
to bed one night, recalling your loved ones and all of the adventures you
embarked in together, and you woke up the next morning, empty. You have no
memories of any previous days or anyone you have ever come in contact with. You
forget names and faces of ones who are close to you. You are suddenly unable to
remember the smell of your mothers’ homemade jam, or the sound of your
childrens’ melodic laughter.
Your Doctor will end up diagnosing
your condition as Alzheimer’s disease, and you may not regain those missing
treasures. It reminds you of a computer that has been rebooted, as if a
mysterious being sifted through your brain, deleting your memories like useless
files. Suddenly you’ve lost everything that means something to you, sure you
would still have your possessions, but those are replaceable, you cannot
replace lost memories.
Of course you’ll try your best to jog
your thoughts, but it will have the same effect as trying to capture air with a
net. Soon enough you’ll start mistaking your family members with salespeople or
strangers on the street. You will have no control over the matter, like trying
to stop the sun from setting each night.
My greatest fear is forgetting my
life. It scares me to think that I could live my life to the fullest, and then
forget who I am. It’s like writing a novel and finishing it years later, just
to have someone come up behind you and burn your only copy. I do not want to
feel I have wasted my time during the only life I get.
At the end of your life, all you have are
those memories you created, which you hold close to your heart. To me, life is
all about making memories and telling stories. Memories help me push through my
fears and any obstacles I may encounter. When I think I am too scared to do
something, I ask myself if it will make a good memory someday, and if the
answer is yes then I will do it. It
doesn’t matter what judgmental people think, as long as you can put a smile on
your children and grandchildren’s’ faces when its story time.
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