Filling in the Gaps

When I was eleven years old my mom got me a small tape recorder for my birthday.  I have held onto the tapes all of these years, but haven’t listened to them in ages.  With the help of one of my brothers who supplied me the necessary power cord, I was able to listen to occasions of my childhood.

The day I got the recorder reveals a young girl trying to learn how to use it.  On and off the recorder went as I talked with my friends and interviewed people in my family—like my mom and grandma—who have since passed.

Those were the days that we waited and waited for our favorite song to come on the radio so we could record it.

My brother has a two-sided, LONG recording of the Apollo launch he must have recorded off the TV or radio.

Birthday party fun and even adult silliness on the tapes have given me snapshots of moments in time I would not have recalled otherwise.  The innocence is remarkable! Listening to myself at that age surprisingly provided hints of who I was to become.  I can see bits of the present-day me in that eleven year old child for sure.  

One of the many hard things about losing someone to death is the stark reality that you have to rely on your memory whenever you want to recall events or details. We don’t get a supply of tapes to fill in the gaps.

Throughout your life you make tons of memories with people, but it seems like a select number of them are the ones that surface now and again.  They poke into your life like little gems that add great beauty to your day, yet bring about the sad recognition that memories are all you have.  No more new ones will be made.

The other part of this is that any questions that you never asked will remain unanswered.  Mostly they could be identified as unimportant, trivial even, but some are definitely more significant. 

You might want to know the name of that place, or who that person was, or a whole host of whys.  What does become significant, you realize, is that you now need to supplement your own recollections with the addition of other people’s memories so you can fill in the blanks.

What happens when you are the last one standing in your family or among your friends, and you become a little more forgetful? It must be a very sad, scary place to be.  Lonely even.  That isn’t my situation, but I feel for those for whom it is.

It has occurred to me that the more you can share your cherished memories with others, the more clearly they will remain in the forefront of your thoughts.  You are less likely to forget them the more you recall them, allowing them to bring laughter and joy into your life in thanksgiving for all the glad times.

The flip side of that is the importance of spending time with your loved ones, now, today, if you can.  Listen to their stories, even if they speak of times before you, places and events that seem distant to you. 

I highly recommend to anyone who will listen to me—take videos, make recordings—not just pictures.  Before my mom died, my brothers and I would often do little vignettes of her to send to the other siblings.  Sometimes they were recordings of her just saying hi and telling us to be safe in our travels, and other times it was so the others could see that she was really okay after a fall or after a hard day.

This collection—which doesn’t seem to be nearly enough today—are what I go to now when I miss her.  I can hear her voice and see that she is okay.  It makes her present to me in ways that my memories alone cannot.

Who knew that our tape recorders (my brothers all got one too) would become an anchor to the past.  Our video phone recordings today do the same.

I’m not a big one to have my picture taken or even be recorded, but I probably should stop “hiding” as I now realize that the snippets that our own kids can manage to acquire of us will be all they will have to hold on to.

If we had snapshots and recordings of Jesus when he was alive, it would certainly solidify for those who doubt what an amazing life he offered for us.  It would immortalize his love, his mission and his sufferings concretely.

But we do have the next best thing.  

Those who were so close to Jesus, his family and friends, have passed on to us who Jesus was.  Those who came to know of him later even share with us what he was all about.  He is not a figment of imaginations.  He was as real as my mom and my grandma on those old tape recordings. 

I would encourage you today to look into the Traditions of the Church, and in addition to that, dig into your bible.  In those two places you will meet Jesus—100% divine, 100% human—and hopefully come to dedicate your life to the one who gave his life for you.

Janet Cassidy
janetcassidy.blogspot.com
janetcassidy.blubrry.net