It occurred to me that, at least in my experience, good memories are like a good wine: as the memories age, they become increasingly better! It may be a trick of the mind, but it seems to me that memories are not just a consciousness of some past event (with all of its circumstances, emotions, etc.), but that they allow one to examine and value an event even though it has already happened.I would suppose, also, that bad memories can become increasingly worse. Like a wine that becomes more bitter rather than sweeter.
Hmm, I don’t know, I’ll have to think about this some more.
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Interesting though, Micah. I think memories are wonderful…good ones at least! In that sense, I think i would like a good wine (but I have tasted a little tiny bit before and I didn’t like it all too well…not at all, in fact!)
I think you are right. It is so strange. I remember thinking when I was in England how strange it was that I would always look on the time I was then spending in England as special memories…even though it just felt normal to be there at the time.
No one could have said it better. Memories are often vivid for me. For example, it’s odd how big things seem to be in my memories of childhood, and how stong memories of smells and scents are. I somtimes imagine that I have even more wonderful and grand memories than I actually have.
Audrey, I used the image of wine because what I hear most often of wine is that it supposedly improves with age.
I have often thought the same thing Micah,…. I have noticed that my memories of certain events or visits, times spent with friends or family for example seem to change as our perspective changes. Especially in the way that you are describing when memories no longer are just based on factual events but start to change subjectively to our impressions, affections and sense of value placed on what we have experienced. Unpleasant things can be forgotten, mondane things turn into treasures…. like Mary who “treasured all these things up in her heart”
Of course we might think she had good reason to -still the Lord thought it worth recording as so many came into intimate contact with Jesus and the events surrounding his birth and were still in unbelief.
I think that the larger context of what your expressing is what I believe a Christian’s memory (starts to become a point of view really) should be seasoned with which is a perspective most affected by a heart full of Gods grace and the enjoyment of looking back on God’s purpose in our lives as we look ahead to his loving provision in the future.
Maybe in heaven our (good) memories will become reality again. In fact, I think that we will look back at our lives, at the good and the bad, and they will turn to good memories because we will see how the Lord was working in our lives. In heaven we will be living in the past, the present, and the future all at once.
Interesting though, Seth!