listening to Regina Spector

hey remember that time when I left flowers on his doorstep
hey remember that time when I skipped over every crack
hey remember that time when I only slept 3 hours a day
hey remember that time when

No,
nobody remembers that time, so I can reframe it any way I want. It’s
not like "no witnesses" was my policy; more like my default position. I
mean, here’s the thing: if you start re-inventing yourself at age 12
and manage to do it consistently every 5 years or so, by the time
you’re 40 it’s like nothing matters anymore because nobody remembers
anything. It’s like reverse vampires: you grow old and everybody else
is young and you have more and more memories and more wrinkles to match
and everybody around you is young and idealistic and you feel like you
except nobody knows the stories. Remember how you linked arms and sang
Gilligan’s Island to drown out stupidity. Hey remember that time when
they almost got off the island. Nobody remembers that anymore. Nobody
remembers that you once wrote letters, nobody remembers what postage
stamps look like, nobody remembers how you put your scent on the paper,
as a clue.

And nobody remembers who you were except every few years one of
them writes to apologize for not treating you better when they were
only treating you how you deserved, oh misery are you so sad tonight.
Nobody remembers but they remember bad, by which I don’t mean badly;
remember how it felt when you thought things mattered, oh those were
the days. My friend.

Remember when you liked people without wondering if you’d miss them when they died. Remember when you met people for a minute. Remember when
watching shit unfold was mysterious, when you couldn’t see where the
story was going before it started. Remember when you thought it would
go on forever.