Letting Go of Everything but My Memories

We write memories of places: the sounds, smells, sights, and emotions the location evokes. We do this to take a mental snapshot of the moment. We try so hard to hold onto the feeling in that exact moment by recording everything around us. When we look back and read it we can close our eyes and be there. The words take us back to that place and those emotions, good or bad. Time is fleeting and memories fade. We write to remember, to hold onto, to go back to. 

I write to evoke emotion. To pull the feelings out of someone running from them as much as I’m running from them. I write because it is too painful to say out loud some of the things that have happened to me. I write to let go of the pain, to release it onto the paper. Maybe it’s a trigger for others. Maybe it’s a way for others to let go as well. Maybe they’ll read my words,burn the page and let go of their own experiences and hurt. 

I write because my memories of my favorite cities will not stay in my mind forever. I write to capture places in their perfect image. 10 years from now, I will have forgotten the way the mountains looked from my window in Costa Rica and how people grilled outside on weekends at the pulperia across the street. The line of taxi cabs waiting on the side of the street at El Parque Bosque. In a few years I’ll forget the way the fog lingers over the city of Lima and blurs the line from the ocean to the sky. Or the brightness of the bougainvillea flowers overflowing onto dusty and dirty walls along the streets of the city, a burst of color in a pale, concrete jungle. I will forget the rolling green hills in Tennessee and the way the sun turns the world gold right before it sets. I’ll forget how the snow in Minnesota turns everything silent as it blankets itself over the streets, lakes and houses. If I don’t write about these places, I will forget the ways that my heart holds onto the places of my past amidst the constant mobility of my life. 

I also write to remember people. The love I’ve had for so many people in all parts of the world. I write down our shared memories to look back on, to read, and to reminisce. To remember the people I met for short moments who left a mark on my heart, so we won’t feel so lonely. We are loved all over the world. I write to visualize the faces, smiles and laughter I experienced with new friends in pubs in Dublin, Turkish restaurants in London and street cafes in Paris. These people with stories that inspire me -- words, encouragement and pain that bring us together from opposite corners of the globe.

I write to grow and move on. My words help me process. I bury my heartbreak on the pages of my notebook. The stories of first dates, first loves, and broken friendships. This life is messy and hard and looking back and seeing what I’ve overcome shows me that I will be fine today, and tomorrow too. I will get through this. With my words, I can turn around and pull someone up who is behind me. Someone who is feeling the same way, who is going through a night that seems just a little too hard. My words can say, “I got through it, and so can you.”. 

What do you write about? What do you write for? What places and moments captured your heart that you had to record it on paper to remember forever?