Memories begin when relationships are killed

Memories begin when relationships are killed. Never leave me alone in an old house with many unexplored cabinets. Memories and relationships. A fundamental confusion. As I hold the pictures in my hand I remember. Remember relationships. We tend to think that memories are about people and places. Memories are of the past. They will never come back. But then even yesterday can also be called a memory too. And no one I know died. Many mornings will never come back but every moment of yesterday is precious. I spent the morning with a bondhu. I look forward to spending many more mornings with that bondhu. In every moment I spend with a person I am living out a relationship, one that started a long ago and one that I hope will continue for a long time. Memories are not about death, but it is about relationships. People may die, but relationships do not have to. The ones I have formed over the years and the ones I will form until I die. And until the relationship is killed it is not a memory. It is a “living” reality of everyday life. It is not death of the people that terrifies me. I know many of the people that I spend time with will die before I am expected to die. But the terrifying part of relationships are the living. Those who are living will become memories not because they will die but a far worse fate awaits. The relationships will die. The relationships I have nurtured might disappear like the morning dew on the lawn. And that disappearance hurts more than death. I will never see my parents again, but my relationship with them will never end. That is not memory. That is my lived life. As I sit in my room I hear the whispers from the other room. Those whispers linger, and I hear them every night because the relationship exists. I see them around me, even if everything in the house has changed, the relationships remain. It is when the relationships disappear that we memorialize what we once had. The ghost of past happiness haunts the living daylights out of us not because the people are gone, but relationships are stamped out. Thus I strive to build relationships, the ones that will live forever. And if I can build that, then there is no reason to lament the yesteryears, because better yesteryears are ahead a year from now. Sometimes I look around I realize that those days will never come back, not because the players are gone but life, with its conventions and judgments, just memorialized cherished relationships. The people will hover around, but there will be nothing left of the relationships with the people. Thus I hope that some relationships will not become memories but will withstand the test of time and circumstances. I feel well prepared to not miss the dead, but inadequately prepared to miss the living. Every moment is a promise of a relationship that makes tomorrow worthwhile, while the relationship of the “old days” give meaning to life. Memorialize relationships and not people. Because people are forced to change, and the relationship may never again be recovered. But know that the relationship will forever be etched into the mind even when the person drifts away and the relationship is memorialized. The old house with many cabinets spewed out pictures – each a relationship. We can’t bring back the dead, but we can re-energize a relationship before it becomes a mere memory. The choice is ours. Memories begin when relationships are killed. The good news for me is that I feel like my relationships are secure and do not need to become memories. But it is useful, to reminisce as suggested by Robert Burns, “Should Old Acquaintance be forgot,/and never thought upon;”