Remember When…

Memory is a fickle beast. In the throes of crippling cabin fever, bordering on a mild case of seasonal depression, the vagueness of warm days and warm rock is simultaneously uplifting and incapacitating. These are so distant that training seems pointless, only holing up for the winter and sucking down calories to stay warm makes sense. Even gym sessions end in disappointment, injury, and lethargy.

Before I get to the point, I want to discuss the mechanics of memory. At a fundamental level, your brain forms memories using biochemical pathways between neural connections. For a short term memory, the biochemistry is simply rearranged, but when you commit something to long term memory, the physical structure of your brain changes. New, permanent connections are made between neurons.

Recalling a memory is, for lack of a better term, a very organic process. It is far from the metaphor of a file-cabinet some may be accustomed to. Recollection is actually using pieces information stored by neural connections to reconstruct, or relive, the memory. This is why you have many of the same feelings and reactions you had in the original experience, as you do when you recall the memory. As climbers, sweaty palms and elevated heart rate are perfect examples of this.

The danger is that memory is highly susceptible to modification. New experiences are constantly bombarding the old ones as they’re being rebuilt in your head. So when you recall little Mikey in 5th grade, who was wearing a blue shirt, tripped in class and spilled his milk, but as you’re remembering this, a little boy in a red shirt walks by, viola, little Mikey forever has a red shirt. This is why eye witness accounts are unreliable as conclusive evidence in court. Science is far from fully explaining the intricacies of memory, but this is basically what they’ve come up with.

It’s so easy, sometimes, to get lost in the tumultuous passage through life. It’s the same feeling you got when you waded out to the deep end of the pool before you knew how to swim. At some point, seemingly so sudden, the bottom of the pool falls away from you and you’re left in panic with no idea of what to do. But, like the comfort of recalling the ability to tread water, the nostalgia of better times can ignite optimism.

This is why I started to write about memories. They have such a power over a person. They can paralyze you with fear, make you writhe in your own skin, or send you into hopeless depression. But they also have the characteristic ability to bring joy, share life with others, and carry you through adversity. In a personal way, they define you. That is what contributing to this site is about for me. It’s a way to share my life with you all. It’s a way of connecting my life to yours and maybe bring a smile occasionally.

Thinking about all this memory stuff reminds me of a short story I read by David Eagleman from his book Sum. He is a neuroscientist by trade, but moonlights as a writer. The story relates to death and the memory of us living in our loved ones. Here is a short excerpt:

There are three deaths. The first is when the body ceases to function. The second is when your body is consigned to grave. The third is that moment, sometime in the future when your name is spoken for the last time.

So you wait in this lobby until the third death… Just be aware that your conversations may be interrupted at any moment by the Callers who broadcast your new friend’s name to indicate that there will never again be a remembrance of him by anyone on Earth.

Mr. Eagleman is telling a story based conclusions from his memory research. That is, every time we remember someone we are literally reliving the experience of that person. So, in a sense, that person lives on through you. To most I have told this story to, it is depressing and morbid, but for some reason it is a strangely comforting story for me. I can’t explain why, but I feel a preeminent sense of closure for the absolute conclusion of my existence in the world. It defines my mortality in a very absolute way.

But that’s a little off topic. What I really want that story to communicate is the singular power of memories. They can, loosely-speaking, extend your mortality. Memories are, in part, why this site even exists. We contribute to share stories with each other. In communal sense, they are a magnetic force to bring us together through our shared experiences, especially in an intense shared experience like climbing. It’s these memories that make me optimistic for the inevitable arrival of spring, warmer days, road trips, and time with friends. Here’s to the coming season and more memories.