The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows Quotes

We take it for granted that life moves forward. You build memories; you build momentum.You move as a rower moves: facing backwards. You can see where you've been, but not where you’re going. And your boat is steered by a younger version of you. It's hard not to wonder what life would be like facing the other way. Avenoir.You'd see your memories approaching for years, and watch as they slowly become real.You’d know which friendships will last, which days are important, and prepare for upcoming mistakes. You'd go to school, and learn to forget.One by one you'd patch things up with old friends, enjoying one last conversation before youmeet and go your separate ways. And then your life would expand into epic drama. The colors would get sharper, the world would feel bigger.You'd become nothing other than yourself, reveling in your own weirdness.You'd fall out of old habits until you could picture yourself becoming almost anything. Your family would drift slowly together, finding each other again. You wouldn't have to wonder how much time you had left with people, or how their lives would turn out.You'd know from the start which week was the happiest you’ll ever be, so you could relive it again and again.You'd remember what home feels like,and decide to move there for good. You'd grow smaller as the years pass, as if trying to give away everything you had before leaving.You'd try everything one last time, until it all felt new again. And then the world would finally earn your trust, until you’d think nothing of jumping freely into things, into the arms of other people.You'd start to notice that each summer feels longer than the last.Until you reach the long coasting retirement of childhood.You'd become generous, and give everything back.Pretty soon you’d run out of things to give, things to say, things to see.By then you'll have found someone perfect; and she'll become your world.And you will have left this world just as you found it. Nothing left to remember, nothing left to regret, with your whole life laid out in front of you, and your whole life left behind.
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
You were born on a moving train. And even though it feels like you're standing still, time is sweeping past you, right where you sit. But once in a while you look up,and actually feel the inertia,and watch as the present turns into a memory —as if some future you is already looking back on it. Dès Vu. One day you’ll remember this moment, and it’ll mean something very different. Maybe you’ll cringe and laugh, or brim with pride, aching to return. or notice some detail hidden in the scene, a future landmark making its first appearance or discreetly taking its final bow. So you try to sense it ahead of time, looking for clues, as if you’re walking through the memory while it’s still happening, feeling for all the world like a time traveler. The world around you is secretly strange: some details are charming and dated, others precious and irretrievable, but all fade into the quaint texture of the day. You try to read the faces around you, each fretting about the day’s concerns, not yet realizing that this world is already out of their hands. That it doesn’t have to be this way, it just sort of happened, and everything will soon be completely different. Because you really are a time traveler, leaping into the future in little tentative steps. Just a kid stuck in a strange land without a map, With nothing to do but soak in the moment and take one last look before moving on. But another part of you is already an old man, looking back on things. Waiting at the door for his granddaughter, who’s trying to make her way home for a visit. You are two people still separated by an ocean of time, Part of you bursting to talk about what you saw, Part of you longing to tell you what it means.
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
Your life is written in indelible ink. There's no going back to erase the past, tweak your mistakes, or fill in missed opportunities. When the moment's over, your fate is sealed. But if look closer, you notice the ink never really dries on any our experiences. They can change their meaning the longer you look at them.Klexos.There are ways of thinking about the past that aren't just nostalgia or regret. A kind of questioning that enriches an experience after the fact. To dwell on the past is to allow fresh context to trickle in over the years, and fill out the picture; to keep the memory alive, and not just as a caricature of itself. So you can look fairly at a painful experience, and call it by its name.Time is the most powerful force in the universe. It can turn a giant into someone utterly human, just trying to make their way through. Or tell you how you really felt about someone, even if you couldn't at the time. It can put your childhood dreams in context with adult burdens or turn a universal consensus into an embarrassing fad. It can expose cracks in a relationship that once seemed perfect. Or keep a friendship going by thoughts alone, even if you'll never see them again. It can flip your greatest shame into the source of your greatest power, or turn a jolt of pride into something petty, done for the wrong reasons, or make what felt like the end of the world look like a natural part of life.The past is still mostly a blank page, so we may be doomed to repeat it. But it's still worth looking into if it brings you closer to the truth.Maybe it's not so bad to dwell in the past, and muddle in the memories, to stem the simplification of time, and put some craft back into it. Maybe we should think of memory itself as an art form, in which the real work begins as soon as the paint hits the canvas. And remember that a work of art is never finished, only abandoned.
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows