Me, Myself and I

It’s a peculiar feeling knowing that you’re the only person in the whole wide world who can validate, or quash every childhood memory that you have.

Think about that for a moment… from now, until end of my life, the way I remember a birthday, a holiday, a discussion or any one of a trillion moments in time... automatically, without question, becomes reality.

Not just my reality… but REALITY.

There’s no one left on this earth to correct me.  No one to tell me, “it didn’t happen like that.”  Nobody to provide an “alternative fact.”  Nobody to keep me honest.

The way I remember a particular event, i.e. who was there, what was said, how a  situation unfolded… must now be considered, by everyone, to be the unequivocal TRUTH.  

That thought is both empowering and debilitating.

It is now my recollection, of everything that happened within my nuclear family, that will forever be accepted as an indisputable fact. 

But wait,  

…if that’s correct, then that means that I (and I alone) am now responsible for accurately recalling and conveying every important (and unimportant) conversation that ever took place; along with every scene that has ever been played out, within my family structure!

No, no, no.   Wait a minute!

How did I get left in charge of this sacred trust?

How did I become “Keeper of the Fucking Memories?”  … left in charge of archchving an entire family’s history!

No seriously… how can there NOBODY left on this entire fucking planet who can corroborate (or contradict) my early childhood and teenage memories?

That’s just insane!

I’m the baby of the family!  I’m the one who gets “let off the hook.”  I’m the one who  concedes.  I’m the one who cries, “UNCLE.”  I’m the one who doesn’t pay attention, because someone else always will, I’m the one who has always had a “grown up” looking out for her.

I should not be allowed to have this great a responsibility… ask my brothers, they’ll tell you…  

Oh… right.

You can’t ask them… They’re not here…

There is nobody to ask.  Nobody to defer to.  Nobody remembering the past with me or telling me what actually did or did not really happen…

There’s no one to ask,  “Hey, remember when….?”

There’s no one who can remember what it was like to sitting by Mom’s hospital bed, for hours and hours, those last several weeks.

There’s nobody who remembers all of those magical Christmas morning’s or the Thanksgiving days that were filled fabulous food and good old fashion football!

There’s nobody left for me to walk down Memory Lane with.

I’m alone with the haunting memories of emptying out our childhood home after Dad died, having to tell Mom’s oncologist, “No… no more surgeries,” siting with Charlie as he took his last breath.

It’s just me.  Me left with nothing…  nothing but memories.

But if it’s only me with a lifetime of detailed, intricate, colourful memories swimming around in my head and there’s nobody left to remember them, dispute them or  substantiate them… I have to wonder, did they really happen?

I guess only I know for sure.

Just me, myself and I.