Why does our past have to color every second of our present?
As a human being, we spend a considerable amount of time thinking about the past, questioning it and very often regretting it. In A Matter of Identity, Oliver sacks says, we are “Continually creating a world and self, to replace what was continually being forgotten and lost.” As we can see in the autobiography Now we are five by David Sedaris, the main character keeps comparing the past and the present, creating a world around himself, where he isn’t necessarily replacing what has been lost, but remembering and reliving it, so it isn’t forgotten. Throughout the story, even though he says how much he misses the past, he also keeps hinting that he is still enjoying the present. He appreciates the present, which most people find very hard to do. He’s trying to move on with life, occasionally remembering those that he has lost, but nevertheless thankful for what he has now. The autobiography Now we are five suggests how as the past moves farther and farther from us, we often keep remembering it and trying to relive it so it isn’t completely forgotten. But it is also important not to cling too hard to the past, otherwise we will forget to appreciate and enjoy the present.
We often keep remembering the past and reliving it so it isn’t completely forgotten. Reading the autobiography, Now we are five, we can see that the narrator keeps remembering his past as well. As the narrator switches between his past and his present, his past mostly contains the memories of his childhood and especially his sister, Tiffany, who committed suicide. We can see this when he says, “On the first afternoon of our most recent trip, we laid out one of the bedspreads we had as children, and arranged ourselves side by side on it, trading stories about Tiffany.” We also see this when he talks about how he “Spent my days on a bike, cycling up and down the coast, and thinking about what had happened.” Even though he keeps remembering the past, he is not the only one who does it. His father also spends a lot of time remembering his wife and daughter. We see this when David Sedaris talks about how he “Came upon my father in Amy’s room, sifting through the photographs that Tiffany had destroyed.” While Tiffany destroyed the memories of her family, his father is trying to save them, by recollecting them in his heart.
As I said before, remembering the past is something we all spend a considerable amount of time on. In these passages, we see different kinds of remembrance, like reliving our past, by doing what we used to do as children, and with that, discussing the good and the bad moments of our past with our friends and family. Another act of remembrance, which we can see here is when we just remember our past all by ourselves. David Sedaris didn’t say if he used to bike when he was small, so he isn’t necessarily recreating his past in that instance, but he’s simply biking and going over the heaps of memories which we all store in some small corner of our brain to deal with later. This ‘later’ part, where all of us just simply smile over some memory and cry over some other memory, comes to our idle brain without any warning. But it really doesn’t need a warning, because we, ourselves, encourage it so that those days we lived, are never lost. Which is why, all sorts of remembrance- discussion with others and personal- are important because our past is precious.
But, do we only remember the past for the sake of remembering what we have lost? Maybe not. There are other reasons for remembering the past like when the narrator talks about why Tiffany committed suicide: “ ‘Why do you think she did it?’ I asked as we stepped back into the sunlight.”
Here is another reason for remembering the past- to question it. Questioning it because we don’t understand why someone would do what they did. Questioning it because we didn’t care then and it is too late now. But even though it is be too late, we question it anyway and try to answer ourselves, because not knowing bring an even greater regret. Not knowing makes us remember the past even more often. But why do we only remember something or think about something so hard when we actually lose it? Maybe because now we understand its value and regret not having cared about it then. In Now we are five, the narrator says, “While the rest of us seem to get along effortlessly, with Tiffany it always felt like work. She and I usually made up after arguing, but our last fight took it out of me, and at the time of her death we hadn’t spoken in eight years” He doesn’t say it, but I wonder if he regrets not having made up with Tiffany before she died, for he will not get the chance to do it ever again. This could also be the reason he keeps remembering the past so often and questioning it. This shows how our past always leaves a trace on us. But should we really cling to it that hard so that it occupies every second of our present, or is it just better to let it go along with all the regrets?
Sometimes it is important not to cling to the past very hard, and just let it go, so that every second of our present isn’t filled with the regrets and miseries of our past. In Now we are five, we see that a lot of times, the main character keeps remembering his past, questioning it and discussing it with his family in order to better understand it. But another thing that we can see is that he is also trying very hard not to cling to it. He is trying very hard to move on with his life and while learning to appreciate his present in the process.
In his autobiography, David Sedaris mentions how he has always wanted a house next to the beach. As a child, his father would bring in practical concerns like the house might not be pretty, it will eventually get blown by a hurricane and so on. When he finally gets to fulfill his dream, he says, “On Friday afternoon, we made an offer on an oceanfront cottage not far from the one we were renting” Now that he finally has his own money and there is no one to stop him from buying a house next to the oceanfront, he goes ahead and buys it, saying that everyone can live in that house with him. This is another reason why our present is so much prettier than our past- now is when we can fulfill our dreams. This shows that as important as our past might be, it is important not to cling too hard to it, otherwise we won’t be able to see the blessings of our present.
Once we learn not to cling too hard to the past, we also learn to enjoy and appreciate our present more. In Now we are five, even though the main character keeps remembering his past, he tries very often not to cling too hard to it and in the process starts to appreciate the present more. A few places where we can see this is when he tells us about how he couldn’t pick his own room when he was small. He says, “I always picked the biggest one facing the ocean, and, just as I’d start to unpack, my parents would enter and tell me that this was theirs.” Being small definitely has it’s disadvantages, but today he can definitely take the best room in the house and no one will even question him because he is the one who has paid for it.
Not clinging too hard to the past doesn’t always mean to stop revisiting those precious moments every single minute our little brains are idle. In the autobiography, after they buy their new house next to the ocean and are debating on what to name it, David’s father suggests that they name it after their mother and Tiffany. We see this when David Sedaris says, “ ‘If that’s the case, we could name it after Mom,’ I told him. ‘Or half after Tiffany and half after Mom. But it’s a house, not a tombstone, and it wouldn’t fit in with the names of the other houses.’” Naming the house after their mother and Tiffany is something they can definately do to honour them, but he also knows that if he names the house after them, they will never be able to move on. Every time that they visit the house, they will keep remembering those they had lost, and the unanswered questions will rise again, frustrating him all over again, and the cycle just goes on. And so, he refuses to name the house after them, giving the excuse that the name won’t fit in with the other houses. Another part where we see that he trying not to cling too hard to the past, is when he is talking to Phyllis, the real estate agent- “Then you’ve got your brother,” she observed. “That makes five — wow! Now,that’s a big family.” I looked at the sunbaked cars we would soon be climbing into, furnaces every one of them, and said, “Yes. It certainly is.” Instead of saying that they were six before, he just decides to let it go and move on, by saying that he does have a big family. Even though he misses those family members he lost, he is happy that he has so many left. And that is what finally shows that he appreciates his present, because our present has so much more to offer. And that is what makes our present so beautiful.
It is important to remember the good and the bad moments of our past, but it is also important,not to be trapped in it. Our past might have been very hard, sure, but some of it was so beautiful too. The thing is that sometimes we do make mistakes and things happen and all of a sudden we start thinking how bad our life is. All of a sudden we start regretting the mistakes we made. All of a sudden we just feel like we don’t want to live this life anymore and we just want to go back to the time when everything was good and much less complicated. But we can’t go back. The only thing we have is today and our future. Regretting our past or thinking about it isn’t gonna change a thing. But thinking about how we can make our present beautiful is sure gonna change a lot of things. Things like our views about our life. Our past always leaves some taints and spots on us, but forgetting it is not what we are trying to do. It is an essential part of us. We have to keep it in our memory because it was beautiful, but we also have to make our present even more beautiful. There is just so much good happening with us right now and so much good that is yet to come, that we absolutely cannot afford to spend all our time sitting and thinking about our past. There is so much to do and so much to experience. Appreciate the present.
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Originally published at flightoffancysite.wordpress.com on February 20, 2016.
