The Memory of Moments

We’ve all experienced those moments that stopped us in our tracks.  We’ve lived through life events that we can picture exactly when and where we were when they happened.  I’ve been around long enough to remember the first world news event that I can remember vividly.  It was the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy in Dallas on November 22, 1963.  As I remember it in my five year old mind, I was watching Heckle and Jeckle cartoons and they suddenly pre-empted all network channels and Walter Cronkite was announcing that Kennedy had been killed.  My mom was riveted to the television and she was crying.  My mom didn’t cry easily.  I wasn’t old enough to take it all in, but I knew it was bad. 

I think back to other events that are forever engrained in my memory almost as if they just happened yesterday: the deaths of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger, the airplanes flying into the twin towers in New York City, the first mass school shooting at Columbine High School.  I remember watching the news footage and feeling the shock and devastation and disbelief as the reports happened in real time. 

Yesterday I was thinking about these life changing events and some others that were personal and closer to home for me.  I can easily recall and relive those big moments that forever alter our lives; things that give us pause, change our trajectory, challenge our beliefs, and set us on a new path.  As I dredge up those memories, it seems that we tend to remember the tragedies, the devastating events, the horrors of our world at its worst.  I tried to remember glorious world events, experiencing incredible moments that brought joy and celebration and positivity.  I really could only remember a few: man walking on the moon for the first time, the “Miracle on Ice” USA hockey team winning the gold in the Olympics, the tearing down of the Berlin wall.  But I really had to work to bring those to mind.

What is it about us that causes those devastating events to stay in our psyche more than the joyful moments?  Is it the unexpected shock that stays with us?  Is it the disbelief that something that bad could happen?  Is it the way the real time footage is played over and over that causes us to imprint it in our memory banks?

I know there will be more very hard moments in the days and years to come.  It’s just the nature of living on earth.  But I also know that there will be amazing, incredible events.  I want those to be forever etched in my memory.  I want to celebrate the best that this life brings.  We might have to dig a bit deeper to find them.  The awful events get more airplay.  What does that do to us as people living in these times?  It’s far easier to get focused on the bad and miss the good.  But let’s resolve to reset our focus.  Let’s seek out the awesome and point to it. Let’s be the news anchors spreading the word about all that’s positive and beautiful among us.  I believe with all my heart that there is way more good than bad in this life we are given.  Let’s live that truth and shout it from the rafters.  We all need to hear it.