Remembering....
I mentioned in my last entry I got the new GB3 cd a couple of days ago. One of the songs on it is "Actress On A Mattress" -- I believe the last song Grant McLennan ever recorded. Tonight that triggered me to do a little musical memorial listening jag. For the past three and a half hours I have been listening to the Go-Betweens, solo Grant, and Jack Frost. He made a lot of great music and listening to it now makes me both happy and intensely sad at the same time.
It's odd perhaps but sometimes I just compelled to remember -- relatives, friends, people such as Grant I never knew but who's work touched me, horrific events and the people caught in them, even pets -- even though it often hurts like hell. It's as if I don't think about them periodically that they will be forgotten, and for me that hurts even worse. There is something tragic about gone AND forgotten.
Some things are etched in my brain because it was either really close to me -- such as the deaths of family members or friends -- or because it was massive and happened when I was old enough for it to stick -- such as 9/11, OK City bombing, etc. But other things I had to learn about as I wasn't around when they happened (or was too young to know).
I remember being obsessed with the Holocaust when I was a freshman in high school. I had been vaguely aware of it before, but in my freshman year I was 12 and a lot of things began clicking in my mind. I read and watched everything I could find about it -- I couldn't quite believe people were capable of something so vicious. That was a shocker for me. A few years later when I was a senior, we studied it in class and as part of that there were a couple of documentaries with footage from the camps shown. We were given the choice to watch or not. I watched. I realise it might sound weird, but I felt I would be betraying all those who went through those camps if I didn't watch. Even though it was over 30 years later, it felt a bit as if I was bearing witness and by doing so all those people would be just a tiny bit less forgotten.
It's odd perhaps but sometimes I just compelled to remember -- relatives, friends, people such as Grant I never knew but who's work touched me, horrific events and the people caught in them, even pets -- even though it often hurts like hell. It's as if I don't think about them periodically that they will be forgotten, and for me that hurts even worse. There is something tragic about gone AND forgotten.
Some things are etched in my brain because it was either really close to me -- such as the deaths of family members or friends -- or because it was massive and happened when I was old enough for it to stick -- such as 9/11, OK City bombing, etc. But other things I had to learn about as I wasn't around when they happened (or was too young to know).
I remember being obsessed with the Holocaust when I was a freshman in high school. I had been vaguely aware of it before, but in my freshman year I was 12 and a lot of things began clicking in my mind. I read and watched everything I could find about it -- I couldn't quite believe people were capable of something so vicious. That was a shocker for me. A few years later when I was a senior, we studied it in class and as part of that there were a couple of documentaries with footage from the camps shown. We were given the choice to watch or not. I watched. I realise it might sound weird, but I felt I would be betraying all those who went through those camps if I didn't watch. Even though it was over 30 years later, it felt a bit as if I was bearing witness and by doing so all those people would be just a tiny bit less forgotten.
posted by eek at 4:35 AM
2 Comments:
great blog, H. and i do know what you mean. it's how i felt when Syd died. Crying for a total stranger.
I am also one who has studied the holocaust on and off since i was 5 and watched The World at War on our maid's tv set. And of course learning more and more about what happened since then. It is a monstrosity i'm not sure the world has ever seen made by the hands of man before.
I am glad you're enjoying Grant's stuff. that is how he'd like to be remembered, i'm sure.
Fantastic blog Miss H! I remember when I went to see Schindler's List. My ex-friend Alex (Alex married to you know who) kept saying "I can't see that movie. It's too horrible. I can't go through it." I was thinking, WTF? YOU CAN'T GO THROUGH IT? Your life has been a cakewalk compared to the horrors those people experienced. THEY went through it. I also felt like I owed it to them to watch and bear witness to what happened. So much tragedy and sadness. And sadly, so much insensitivity and shallowness on some people's parts too IMHO.
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