~~ Forgotten Memories ~~

Hola! Its been ages since I blogged. I keep reading these awesome posts from so many people in my organization's blogosphere and I get all inspired to pen down something, anything and open notepad/word doc and then a sudden dull helplessness envelops and threatens my core existence here in this space in the name of writer’s block!

Its sometimes annoying that not even a single thought crosses my mind when my being just wants to type away to glory. The very same busy mind that was, a moment ago, abuzz with million thoughts worth chronicling, is blank in a split second when I manage to open the notepad/word doc to jot them down. I almost was about to resort to Google God and research on “How to avoid writer’s block” but then decided against it and continued staring at the blank document and the blinking cursor for the nth time in the 23 days and a lot many hours of the 24th day that have gone by, in this month. I am not sure which is making me suffer more, the writer’s block or the equivalently persistent common cold turned dry cough that doesn’t seem to go away even after 2 rounds of antibiotics!

Hell bent on writing something today, after being doubly inspired by one of the blogging legend I know from my organization's blogosphere, I was focusing intently, when suddenly, the floodbank made way and a series of memories overwhelmed me. Memories are so powerful, aren’t they? They have this ability to make you feel safe, warm and all happy from within and at times, have this absolute power to shake your beliefs and question you about yourself. I always keep going back to my safest happiest memories and at times to the worst ones too. I relive them and jump from “How blessed I am” moments to “Just be grateful” moments to “Why God, Why me??” moments! I guess, its not something unique and happens with everyone. Its surreal that those few good basketful of memories still manage to bring a smile on your face on an otherwise uneventful day and the very few worst ones still manage to rattle you a bit, though the events have long gone by. Its also magical that a particular place, a song, a book, a color, a phrase, a thing, a movie, a perfume, a snack,  a portrait, a painting or even a small ticket stub is enough for us to sift through those loads of memories to pick and relive the one that we associate it with! Mysterious, isn’t it!!?

Well, I am not going to write about those whole load of memories that suddenly made its presence felt, but about a revelation that shook me for a while, few weeks back.

I am quite a memory person – I have always believed that every significant and insignificant happening in my life is safely tucked somewhere in my memory bank for me to access whenever I want. You must be aware of the forward that makes rounds about the red dot aka bindi on a woman’s forehead being used by her to record every single detail for future arguments, well, that is pretty much true in my case, as I can remember many minute details about an event or a happening, however, I seldom get to use them, and on rare occasions that I do get an opportunity, I just don’t seem to remember these important memories and always end up remembering it after the moment has passed and feel helpless about the fact that such a good memory was wasted and never used for the purpose it was stored for! Phew, I know, I am complicated.

Anyways, coming back to the point, recently, I had a revelation that we can forget a few cherished memories too, even when we are still very young *ahem* *cough* *cough* *I-am-young* *cough* *antibiotics-do-your-job-please*

In a recent conversation with my younger brother, I mentioned about having bought a scrabble word game and I went on to explain about the rules assuming he had not played the game. He was amused at first and then after listening to all that I had to say, he gently (*ahem*) reminded me about how, years back, we had created one of our own, as we considered it was damn too costly to buy one, and how we had played non-stop with it, and more importantly, how he had won multiple times  I rolled my eyes  laughed out loud  and told him not to fabricate a story of him winning in a game, with ME, that too, in a game involving English words (not that I am great at it, but well, that’s how we siblings fight, right?)!! He kept insisting that we did play scrabble and I definitely had created the game from scratch at home *whatsapp-forefinger-on-the-chin-smiley*

Just to prove that he was wrong (again a sibling thingy), I asked mom, face-palming myself big time, when she affirmed about we having played such a game, created by me after we had played with a real one in a relative’s place and how we, the sis-bro duo were addicted to the game  I was super flabbergasted! She went on to explain, how I had created these small cute cut outs from white chart paper and had written on each of them, the alphabets with their points and apparently, we also had maintained a record of points every time we played, which later my brother claimed, that the notebook with the points still existed somewhere in the attic of our house and can definitely be found if the attic is thoroughly searched. He was plain furious when my mom pitched in to let him know that the attic was cleaned long back and all old stuff donated/discarded.  I was not going to let the chance go by and kept teasing him about the imaginary notebook which holds the record of he winning against me 

We laughed it off later where he reminded me that it was not the only one thing where he had won and the conversation went on to other memories of our childhood. Seriously, why did childhood end, such carefree days!

After the conversation ended, my mind raced back to the fact that a slice of my life has not been considered worthy enough by whichever force decided what remained in my memory and what gets replaced with new fresh memories.

Even as I type this, try as I might, that particular memory which involved a lot of effort in me creating those tiny cut outs and the board, just evades me. I just cannot remember creating the game from scratch and playing scrabble with my brother at all., though I remember a lot other games that we both have played, fought about, yet played!

A typical eternal-sunshine-of-the-spotless-mind moment.

Time to worry? Am I just getting old too fast than I normally should? *clears – throat* *affirms-I-am-young* *still -worries* *and-continues-to-worry* *cough*

Well,  be nice and say, nooooooooooooooooooo, don’t worry, you are not getting old!! Will you?