The Museum In My Heart - Memories

By Immane A Shiphrah

We leave parts of ourselves in the past, imprints of our desires and pieces of our broken heart. When we turn to  look back on the path that we’ve travelled, we understand that though we seemed to be going in the right  direction, we are just lost souls at the end of the day. We chase shooting stars that fall anyway. We pile up our  experiences and gather all the shattered pieces and turn them into art. We build a museum with relics of our own  and call them memories. One day when we drive home on an empty highway, the past flashes as a reel before  our eyes. We can’t help but hit the breaks and close our eyes and travel back in time. Memories surface when  our thoughts sink deep. Just like Charles Lamb says we’re nothing but half Januses, while looking forward we always tend to look backwards. Memories are museums containing our past pieces.

MUSEUMS precisely,  because we can neither touch or feel any of those parts but just stare at them endlessly. Memories live in our  minds rent free. Remembering things is a cursed blessing. Good things remind us of how beautiful life was  while reminding us of the irrecoverable loss of what was. It’s actually better to not have felt pure bliss in life.  Because it’s far better to live with the thought of ‘the best is yet to come’ than to rot everyday longing to relive  the long gone best parts of your life. It is cruel to remember, it pains the heart. It lets it ache, it makes it starve.  All the stars would fade and the planets stop, if the curse of memory was retrieved. They wouldn’t find the need  to shine as bright and spin as fast in longing to feel better some day. But trust me, as intense as memories  torment, they are the only evidence of what we’ve lived. Just imagine a time when you look back to see how far  you’ve come, and see nothing. That would indeed hurt worse. Good memories are not to be longed for but  cherished. Just like Scott Fitzgerald once said, “In the end memories are all you keep”. As much as it is a curse  its an inevitable blessing which breathes life into our beings. Oh the power of remembering and the beauty of  memories, we often forget to remember. Or maybe remember to forget.

By Immane A Shiphrah