When memories are merely jogging in place

The Boston Globe

Beverly Beckham

We remember it differently. Anne says that we went to Story Land on a summer day not more than five years ago. And that we walked around, just the two of us, enjoying the scene. Going there was my idea because I wanted to revisit a place I had come with my parents and my grandmother when I was a child.

I don't dispute being with my parents and my grandmother. I wore an aqua-and-white dress, which I hated. I posed with the Old Lady Who Lived in a Shoe. I smiled for the camera. This was nearly 50 years ago.

And I don't dispute that I returned as an adult to this fantasy land in southern New Hampshire, and that I went with my friend Anne. But I say it was 10 years ago, not five, and that on that day we did not stroll the grounds on our own; the owner's son gave us a personal tour.

Anne says, "No. No. Look it up in your journal." And so I go searching for a ticket stub, a photo, for something that will settle this.

But I find nothing, not even a ticket stub.

My oldest daughter turned 35 last week and what she wanted most for her birthday was to remember turning 21. "I was in college. I must have gone out. Where did I go? What did I do?"

We sat around the table, family and friends, trying to remember something of her 21st birthday. But none of us could.

You think you don't forget the big moments: birthdays, holidays, milestones. But they slip away, too, like thousands of small moments lived and celebrated, and then forgotten.

I started a journal 13 years ago, though "journal" may be the wrong word. My youngest child came home from high school with a blue exam book and a glue stick. Her assignment was to cut and paste and write or scribble anything that she felt like pasting or scribbling, to use this booklet as a kind of scrapbook, not just of her thoughts but of her life.

Her teacher called it a "common place book" because it was a place for everything common - notes, jokes, cartoons - anything that interested her. I watched her fill it, cutting and pasting and having fun. And then I joined her because I wanted to keep a record of what I was doing, too, but journals with their blank pages and the onus of writing every day were intimidating. I'd tried journals and failed.

This seemed easy.

And it was.

The first thing I pasted in my small square book, a gift from a friend, was a piece of paper covered with crayon marks and names. Crayola, back in 1993, had a contest asking people to name its 16 newest colors. I would have denied the effort I put into this contest if I didn't have proof. But there it is in Butterscotch and Sidewalk Gray - not to mention Wild Hyacinth, Reptilian, Sweet Clover, Ruby Rose, Warm Blush.

I still think I should have won.

There are all kinds of superfluous things in these books. Dozens of ridiculous facts: "Chameleons do not deliberately change color to match their background. Their nerves and hormones are affected by light, temperature and emotion."

And predictions: "`The fastest growing industry of the 90s will be gambling,' predicts the Kiplinger Washington Letter."

And pithy sayings: "Smooth seas do not make skillful sailors."

And long-forgotten news events: "School kids trim the Tremont House tree!"

But there are treasures, too. A memory: "I just auditioned to be a napkin in Beauty and the Beast." A card signed, "Love, Love, Love, Dad." A contract: "I promise if you get me a dog I will feed it and walk it and do everything for it." Pictures of my grandchildren, Lucy and Adam, before they were born.

But there's nothing about my daughter's 21st birthday, because it happened before I kept track. When my daughter turned 21, I didn't write about it, and she didn't write about it, or paste a coaster in a book or preserve it in any way.

And so it came, it went, and it's gone.

Most days are. We live thousands of them and recall just a few. Pictures capture some. And words. And song.

And sometimes something as simple as a saved ticket stub will bring back a day, or at least a part of it.