Fond memories are what left behind us when we are advancing according to the operating rules of life. Therefore, speaking of fond memories is speaking of what belong to the past, of what lie still within distant recollection. Although fond memories are within recollection, fond memory and recollection are not really the same thing. There are some recollections that we don’t want to recall, to be faced with again. On contrary, fond memories, happy or not, bring to our mind the sacred, regretful moments of remembrance; they make us want to relive those moments, to once more “swim in the same flow of river water”, even though we know for sure it is impossible.
Most of us probably want our recollections to be fond memories fully covered with honey. The gap between recollections and fond memories is eternally a sacred secret of every human being’s fate. And the gap is not unchangeable, it changes in accordance with the ups and downs we experience in life. There are some sections of life in which every minute we live through is considered a fond memory, while there are others which are so tasteless and unbearable that they are merely painful recollections.
Like human beings, fond memories are born, grow up or die down. Every fond memory has its own fate as every human being’s life does. There are some fond memories which live forever and become immortal while the others die early in a pitiful way due to insiders’ indifference. Fond memories are easy to take of, not demanding as much care as a spoiled child. They just ask for honesty and relative loyalty. Unfortunately, honesty has become something so rare in the modern society like rain drops in the desert; and not few people are willing to exchange loyalty for one dollar. They reason that honesty doesn’t help them to advance in their careers nor can loyalty help them to overcome hunger. Fond memories listen to their reasoning feeling dazzled and speechless by its painfully undeniable accuracy.
Fond Memory and I have been close buddies, very close to each other. We are just like blood brothers, unable to live separately without each other. I treasured every moment I lived by or even those ones I were living in, realizing that they would soon become fond memories. On those days, we lived together in a perfect harmony, which we were unsure came from me being so innocent or from her being so easy-going. We were seldom in a sulk nor blamed each other. She quietly followed every step of mine saying nothing but giving me a look which said much more than any kind of language.
Then came one day when a severe storm approached, an earth-and-heaven-shaking storm. I had to leave in an extreme urgency seeking for refuge without time to say goodbye to Fond Memory nor promise to see her again. Then we were parted so far away from each other with lots of high mountains, lots of long rivers and lots of deep seas in between. Fond Memory stayed put with the old times, with the narrow paths we used to escort each other through. I lived far away, missing her like missing a mistress, constantly tossing myself about in bed in the middle of regretful sleep. Many times did I want to come back to pay her a visit but couldn’t. All I could do was to pray God for her peacefulness within old recollection. Sometimes, Fond Memory tried to send me some messages which gave me some weird feelings of her coming future.
I came back to pay Fond Memory a visit as soon as the storm had gone away just in time to find her on her dying bed in the last minutes of her life, just in time to hear from her some sorrowful account of her coming death. She told me that since I left, nobody had ever paid attention to her any more. She was left in a dark corner totally ignored like a useless commodity. Everybody was busy out there with their own schemes of making rich, with their enjoyment of pleasure. Nobody was bothered to pay attention to her who had become too old constantly mumbling of the past. There were a few times, out of deep longing, she stopped by her close friends for a visit just to finally receive a cold, unwelcome look. She quietly turned back home, finding herself gradually dying in an utterly pain of humankind's behaviors to her.
After releasing sorrowful and plaintive account, she gave out her last breath on my arms. I painfully embraced her in my lap but my tears did .........not come out.
01/23/2011
Jeffrey Thai
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