Forgetting to Remember
Drew Barrymore and Adam Sandler co-starred in a movie way back in 2004 called “50 First Dates”. The premise was sad and cute. Drew is in an accident that leaves her incapable of remembering anything. Each morning she wakes up and hasn’t got a clue what’s up. Adam Sandler loves Barrymore’s character but he cannot woo her a little bit at a time. He has to woo her every single solitary day. Lots of madness and mayhem add to the comedic effect but cannot fully disguise the tragedy of being a person who cannot remember the love of their life once they fall asleep each night. Drew and Adam figure it out; they learn how to work with the disability.
We have a similar disability. We forget, resist remembering, however we want to frame it - knowing and living out the most important realities of life as a faithful people.
Humankind was created as God’s reflection: in the divine image God created them; female and male, God made them...God looked at all of this creation and proclaimed that this was good - very good.
~ Genesis 1:27, 31
My friend with the abusive husbands? She will tell you and anyone who listens that she is only “good” when she is dangling from the arm of a man who gives her expensive stuff. The young man who caused our car accident cannot seem to remember that all his driving mishaps were HIS FAULT!
My grandson, at only two years of age is developing amnesia too. It is developmentally appropriate amnesia, but it is amnesia. Prior to the age of two, it didn’t occur to my grandson that people he loves might leave. I’m not talking abandonment! He’s at that age when he doesn’t like us to leave the room we’re playing in. No potty breaks for Meme! No grabbing a cup of coffee from the kitchen without Christian looking up from his play and saying, “Meme. No leave Christian Tommy. Sit.” It is all very endearing. Never in his life has anyone left him...and not returned. But he’s getting old enough to wonder if someday that might happen.
My seven month old granddaughter has none of these issues. She is confident, as he was at that age, that the world revolves around her. Her people do NOT leave.
I am fascinated by this process of remembering and forgetting. I am extremely concerned to realize that we can forget things that are true - even without obvious reason to become forgetful.
We need to figure this out. What do we do? How do we change this propensity to forget? We’ll talk more about this in future days.
