How is it possible that two persons recall differently an event that
happened years ago? Often one person remembers something vividly, and the other
doesn’t, and even doubts it ever happened. Why?
We know that family members have different memories of
past events. The same occurrence may be recalled in different manners by each
member of the family to the point that it may not appear as the same episode.
I have come to ruminate about these things because of
late I have had some experiences with hindsight and recalling things past which
baffle and puzzle me.
In her VOXXI
post “Three Kings: a great excuse to eat Roscón de Reyes.” (Jan 5, 2013) my
daughter Laura recalls her childhood; and writing about the hidden prize or
gift in the pastry called Roscón, says: “I must add that my family cheated a bit! We would discover that my dad’s good luck
at finding the hidden prize over and over again was not such; he would stick
his finger under the dough unbeknownst us, so when it was time to choose a
slice he knew where the prize was hidden. Funny, yes, but disappointing!” Of course I do not remember it that way, at all. Was I
really a cheat? Did I swipe the “prize” from my own children? Was I so
childish? Do I have 10/20 “hindsight” memory?
My good friend
Silvano Corrêa from Sao Paulo, reminiscing about our days as undergraduates at
Duquesne University, says I had an affair with a girl named Penny.
Unfortunately I never had affairs with anyone –remember that I am a bookworm-
especially with this Penny he keeps mentioning. But Silvano insists. Is he
right? If so, why can’t I remember? Or is he wrong and his memory is playing tricks
on him?
In his The
Psychopathology of Everyday Life, 1901, Sigmund Freud wrote: “…listen to two persons exchanging reminiscences
concerning the same outward impressions, say of a journey that they have taken
together some time before. What remains most firmly in the memory of the one is
often forgotten by the other, as if it had never occurred, even when there is
not the slightest reason to assume that this impression is of greater psychic
importance for the one than for the other. A great many of those factors which
determine the selective power of memory are obviously still beyond our ken.”
Memory is
selective and retains what strikes it firmly, while at the same time dismissing
events that, for whatever reason, do not interest the intellect and thus are
not retained. David Hume (1711-1776) called memory impressions and ideas in
his A Treatise of Human Nature.
Probably you have
had similar experiences when going over past events in your family. You
remember well the 5000 dollars you lent your brother-in-law two years before,
but he does not seem to be able to recall that, and he swears he never received
the money. One person recalls her childhood and adolescence as nightmarish
while her sibling remembers it as nice or even idyllic. We tend to forget our
promises, our debts, disagreeable appointments, and occurrences that might
bring discomfort. Go figure.
Freud went
further when he said that the
forgetting in all cases is proved to be founded on a motive of displeasure,
which may not be off the mark, off the wand, really. Memory is very picky and
tries to ensure our well-being by erasing what we dislike or hurts us, in a
healthful attempt to keep us sane.
There is no tangible, solid evidence –a photograph
catching me in the act- of my cheating my children with the cake; and in the
case of my affair at Duquesne, it is my friend’s word against mine: he has no
pictures, letters or witnesses. So, when someone asserts something as Gospel
truth, from memory, it would be good to remember that that person may not have
a 20/20 hindsight. Judges in Court think otherwise.
Hindsight is 20/20 when we realize we made the wrong
decision in the past, when it is too late to mend. But, as the saying goes, it
is asinine to close the barn door after the horse has bolted.
Yet the past always seems better, as Jorge Manrique
told us: Cualquier tiempo pasado fue
mejor, because memories fade and finally disappear, even collective
memories, luckily, as Edward Berenson points out in HuffPost, March 25, 2013.
(to be continued as Part II: Collective Memory.)
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