"And then they stick the knife in and bleh," Jerry uses his hands to signal a slow-motion explosion while simultaneously blowing a deep gurgling raspberry with his lips. I smile and listen patiently to the ever-changing story of Jerry's first experience with haggis. The guests at the table are mesmerized by the story, as none are familiar with the part tradition, primarily the tongue-in-cheek feature of the haggis ceremony. (1)
My loving wife Linda had a schedule conflict for an upcoming business trip to Edinburgh, Scotland, and offered to give up her seat to my long-time friend and avid golfer Jerry in exchange for the simple request of tasting the haggis when served. After the ceremony, we take our plates and move through the buffet line, servers on one side and tourists on the other. Poor Jerry had worked himself into such a fervor over the simple request to taste the haggis he was sweating and pale.
"I just couldn't do it." Jerry expounds to the table like he was asked to lift the Husafell Stone. (2) The table looks to me for confirmation, and I sigh, "it's pudding," I say. "In a sheep's stomach!" Jerry responds in an almost Abbott and Costello routine that we have perfected over the years. Heads bounce back and forth, and eventually, the conversation dies to a round of laughter as the topic drifts towards golf or the University of Oklahoma (3) football team's recent performance.
I smile as I remember writing about the haggis experience in my journal, and if needed, I could go back and verify any of the events that took place over our week-long holiday. But unfortunately, our thoughts and memories are fragile, and unless we capture them in the moment or shortly after, they fade into obscurity or grow into distorted proportions. But, primarily, memories fade.
I've spent the past several weeks digitizing many of my old journal entries; the process will undoubtedly take months, and I find it difficult at times to reconcile my younger self's immaturity with my older self's memories; however, I am often genuinely surprised by an entry and grateful for the recording of an event that helps bring emotions and feeling once again to the surface.
"Your own ideas will vanish if not cared for," says Christian Tietze in his essay about having faith in our writing. (4) "Everything else can be re-obtained from the source if need be." So we spend hours researching, referencing, and summarizing the written words of others, creating Zettelkastens and Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) schedules to track and monitor their thoughts. While the source of our ideas, beliefs, and experiences remain undocumented, existing solely as electrical impulses between the gray matter of our brains. Few of us are comfortable relying on such whimsical material for our research references; how much more then should we depend on it for the story of our lives?
Written January 13, 2023
Footnotes:
Haggis. (2022, December 30). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haggis
Lifting stone. (2022, December 20). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifting_stone
Jerry’s all time favorite sports team.
Tietze, Christian. (2014, October 25). Zettelkasten. Retrieved October 20, 2019, from https://zettelkasten.de/posts/dont-rely-on-source-have-faith-in-yourself/