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Forgettance of Things Past
From a letter Feb '92
Memories are slick and tough to keep ahold of. For example, I did a lot of stuff this last weekend. I moved into a new apartment, visited with family, went to see Psychedelicatessen, unpacked, interior designed, and bowled. I'm pretty sure there's some anecdotes I could glean from all that material. But sometimes something comes along that just makes all those memories just zip out of your head.
Apparently, flying fish can have that effect on me. The last thing I remember really clearly, you see, is when I was making dinner tonight. I was making tuna salad, you see. And I had just opened up the can of tuna and was draining the oil out. My way of doing that is to leave the top on the can and hold the can over the sink, at an angle. I then squeeze on the top and the oil comes around the top and drips into the sink. But tonight I guess I was working with a substandard can, because when I applied the usual amount of pressure, the top suddenly gave way, creased in the middle, and squeezed great globs of tuna into massive splatty piles all over the kitchen. That must have been a rather traumatic experience, because I don't remember much of anything from before that point.
I know that I failed in my attempt to pull an all-night packing maneuver Friday night. I remember that the moving truck was old and argumentative. I remember that my cousin Sierra wanted to know why my hair was still so long. I remember thinking that Amy X. Bamberger was an okay singer, but was a better sysop. I remember that when I tried to unpack my records, half of them fell on the floor. I see that my stereo is at present sitting sideways in a milk carton. Apparently, I bowled over a hundred last night, though I hadn't been bowling in something like ten years. But those are just facts, not really events. I don't remember much of anything specific from these happenings. And I really think it's the shock that resulted when the tuna went airborne.