storied

do you ever think about all the stories you’ve forgotten?

all those intimate moments you have with people, where they open themselves up to you and let you take a peek under the hood at what the turning cogs of their mind have seen and experienced – do you ever wonder how much of that you’ve forgotten?

your mind’s accessible memory card is constantly refreshing with fresh information. new movies, new art, new recipes, new clothes, new pictures, new friends. and with that, new stories.

I was watching the world cup recently and remembered an old story an old friend told me at the pub as we watched England lose a match at far too early in the morning.

just last week I ate a Caramilk and remembered they were somebody’s favourite.

more recently I remembered a story of my own that I’d told someone that I no longer have in my orbit.

it’s funny how you fill your head up with all this important stuff. birthdays, favourite flavours, album recommendations, go-to drink orders and a person’s favourite team. and then as quick as you’ve blu-tacked that poster up, you forget about the poster you took down to make space for it.

watching people come and go through your life is one of those things that you don’t notice entirely until you properly take a minute and reflect on their leaving. so many rituals and ceremonies misplaced and forgotten, to mourn them all would be a daily funeral. so, you do what the planet does. you keep moving.

you remember the new friends favourite IPA. the new work colleague’s birthday. the bar that friend’s cousin recommended.

and you forget the old things.

and rarely do you consider that to someone else’s mind, your things are the old things.

your favourite movies, your parents’ names, your comfort food, your most-played arcade game, your birthday.

the little puzzle pieces that make up the larger image of you, those pieces that you hand-carved and keep up on display and dust irregularly and update occasionally – those cherished parts of you have come and gone through somebody’s life like a missed train or a brief shower of rain.

it hurts to crack open that book of memories and bear witness to the kill-list of friends and loved ones you’ve lost in one way or another. whether it’s time or otherwise.

but somehow, knowing that your name and face and favourite type of pizza are scribbled out in somebody else’s book hurts far worse. at least, it does to me.

I guess part of the tapestry of my life that I’m pretty proud of is my stories. I like to think that I’ve lived a little fast and a little loose, built a wealth of experience and misery and have just the disc to lend to a friend in a moment of required empathy or simply for the sake of good conversation.

I love my Rolodex of anecdotes, and to know that I’ve passed out some of those stories to people who have since discarded them (naturally, as I discard others’) makes my heart sink through my chest.



a couple of weeks ago, I got some advice from one of the few lifelong friends that have stuck around for the carnage that is bearing witness to my personal car crash of life – one of those people whose stories I haven’t forgotten, at least not by choice. one of those people who makes a regular appearance in my stories, and hopefully I in his.

he told me – and I’m paraphrasing here – “Don’t move backwards. Never look back. There’s only forward.” which is a surprisingly profound thing to say coming from somebody I’ve seen projectile vomit onto his own front lawn.



I’ve spent so many years gazing into the past with rose-tinted glasses stapled onto my head. as I’ve moved through and recycled people and collected fresh rituals and ceremonies, I’ve spent too long romanticising the past and blinding myself to my own future.

but these last few months I’ve worked quite hard on building the new me. looking as far forward as I can. keeping an impossibly full calendar and putting these good few years I’ve got left to use. and I’m proud of it.

but the emotional stubbed toe of recalling a lost friend’s story subconsciously as something uninvited reminds me, that feeling isn’t something that’s left me behind. despite my superglued neck forcing me forward, there’s always that.

moreover, there’s always my own stories lost to the sands of time. it’s an emotional whiplash of “hey, I remember that time!” and “oh, it was with those people” that never fails to hurt like stepped-on Lego.


I’ll keep working on it, I suppose. there’s only forward.