The Forgetting Cure
I deeply deeply deeply identified with this essay on the reason the author takes photos. It has everything to do with a fear of forgetting. If you take a photo, and you can look back on the photo, you can release your mind from the act of active remembering because you can always access the moment by looking at the picture.
Even when I wanted to stop taking photos, I couldn’t. I had no plans to post on social media—I had no plans for the photos at all. It was more that taking them became an expression of emotion I didn’t otherwise know what to do with: affection rendered desperate, like hugging someone so they can’t get away.
Making the photo album is the first thing I do once I get home from a big trip. During the trip, we keep a detailed audio journal. Everyone sits around the recorder and talks out a 15 minute play-by-play of the day: Funny snippets of conversation we overheard, which subway lines we used, what we ate, how we felt or what we were thinking about in various moments. And that is super helpful to use later on when we’re trying to remember the order we did things or the name of a random restaurant. But it’s also fun to listen to the twins tell us what they noticed, how they processed things — at eight, at twelve, at seventeen.
The photo album is the other protection again the brain from forgetting. I create a key to the photos — a printed PDF that gets tucked in the back of the book that states the date each photo was taken, which one of us took the photo, and the importance of the image. It takes hours, and I often wonder if it’s worth it. But we all look at the photos during the year, so I’m happy that we have them. But, moreover, they make my brain relax because I don’t have to remember every single detail. It’s all captured in the books.
That advice to live in the moment and not photograph everything is great. Except it wouldn’t work for me. Because I would spend that time in the moment worried about forgetting. So unlike the author, I’m happy with the number of pictures I take, the times I take them, and the way I use them after.
3 comments
I find I am more relaxed when I don’t feel the need to photograph every moment. I look at my mom’s scrapbooks with photos and stories, and I love them, but they’re not comprehensive. It was a special occasion only thing, because film and development wasn’t free. I have a lot of great pictures of everyday things that are, to me, more valuable than my vacation pictures. My vacation journals are fun – and, when we read my mom’s Italy journal, we laughed a lot because it was 90% “my kids are so mean to me,” and “this architecture isn’t all that” with about 10 % “nice food and scenery.” But the everyday things need to be curated, since no one needs 8,000,000 screenshots of memes or grocery lists. I guess that will be a retirement project.
I wish I had pictures of my different bedrooms growing up. That would help jog a lot of memories. I love seeing old pictures of people, food, and events, but it’s the every day stuff that I miss remembering the most.
I’m with you. When I’m choosing something to photograph, I’m thinking about it, wanting to recreate my wonder or the atmosphere of the experience, and trying to recreate that in photos. It helps me recall the experience. So I love your idea that it helps you not forget. (I love your idea of recording your memories of the day!) I wrote this back in 2017 along the same lines – https://aseparatelife.wordpress.com/2017/10/05/to-photograph-or-not-to-photograph/