Years ago I read author Wally Lamb’s I Know this Much is True. I recall a phrase he used that has stuck with me over the years. He described a character who, after suffering a profound loss, managed his grief like a curator in his own personal Museum of Misery. He was stuck in his grief, preserving and visiting emotional and sad curated wounds in a way that wasn’t conducive to becoming “unstuck”. This kept the main character mired in sorrow.
I haven’t built my own personal Museum of Misery, but I do maintain a museum of sorts that helps me preserve items and photographs of people and places, so many reminders of things past. Having moved often in the past six years, I find myself going through boxes of items that traveled down to Old Florida with me when I arrived here three years ago. I still find it hard to part with these significant reminders of my past life so they follow me. I’m slowly mailing items to family members and they seem to truly appreciate having actual photos as we rely on online images so much these days.
Being a curator of a Museum of Memories is difficult, but important work. With so many of my significant family members gone, I believe that if I don’t share their time in this world how can they be recalled and their lives acknowledged? All those special occasions, accomplishments and milestones that once were so important now almost forgotten. Each snapshot captures those moments and if I choose to discard them I feel I’m failing as a memory keeper, erasing their contributions to the world. I know I can have them digitized, but there is something about holding a real photo that can’t be replicated online.
When I visit an actual art museum, I wander through each room. Although an exhibition may not display my favorite period, or artist, I try to appreciate these masterspieces, and marvel at how someone could create a work so fantastic at a time when there was no technology and limited supplies. I honor these amazing accomplishments, but I don’t linger too long in these rooms that don’t bring me the most pleasure. I know the Impressionists await me just through the doorway and make my way towards it with happy anticipation. There, I immerse myself in their vibrant displays of diffused light and water.
This reminds me a bit of the Wally Lamb museum analogy. We can honor and see the value of those things that may still bring us heaviness and sorrow, but know that the next room can offer lighter and happier moments and I have a choice on which to focus. It also makes me smile that Wally Lamb is a UCONN alum like me!
This last week of October holds some significant dates for me. October 26th is the date of my youngest brother Matt’s passing back in 2005 and October 28th will mark the 5th anniversary of my late-husband Rich’s passing. They got along well and we all spent lots of good times together and many of my memories of them are on display in my Museum of Memories (aka as a garage).
I post about Rich, and the other five family members that no longer grace my life because it’s important to share their lives with others and to give them the place of honor they deserve; Matt, a tree-loving landscaper; troubled, but kind and an animal-lover. Rich, authentic, boisterous, a dog-loving friend to all, who proudly served as Navy Corpsman (Doc for the US Marines) and devoted and encouraging husband.
They are missed every day, but are still present in heart, mind and spirit…and in boxes still yet to be opened.
