The vault
 

Take a step back from your self when you notice it. You have that feeling like everything is going OK. You're enjoying the moment, and wish you could save the feeling. Maybe you're watching your kids having fun, or the weather is just perfect, and you've just done some yard work, or you notice how much you love your spouse...... whatever... Stop and look around. At the moment when you realize your contentment, take a mental photograph, sniff the air.... Pick out a unique image or color, or something to tie it to, and freeze it. Think of other times when you felt like this.


Now lock it up in the Vault. Visualize physically stashing this feeling inside a big cartoon safe with the big tumbler on it. put it with those other memories, and lock the safe.

the big thing is to remember to open that safe and take the memories out every now and again.

Wouldn't it be better to try to recreate it every day?

YEAH....but you can't. life happens...

and if everyday was like that, it would be nothing special.

Brilliant LJ.

I like your posts about remembering to enjoy what's really important in life, jim.

Me too ...

R S Thomas said a similar thing, in one of my very favourite poems:

A Day in Autumn

It will not always be like this,
The air windless, a few last
Leaves adding their decoration
To the trees’ shoulders, braiding the cuffs
Of the boughs with gold; a bird preening

In the lawn’s mirror. Having looked up
From the day’s chores, pause a minute,
Let the mind take its photograph
Of the bright scene, something to wear
Against the heart in the long cold.

About a month ago I was just lying on my back in the backyard, looking up at the canopy of pecan trees rustling gently in the breeze, and hearing the chatter of my kids playing in the yard somewhere nearby, and I thought to myself "Right now, at this moment, this is the happiest I've ever been."

What made that moment possible is a huge structure of events and conditions, chiefly the support and camaraderie of a loving wife and everything that has precipitated from my union with her; and all of that is contained neatly in the snapshot I have of those swaying pecan branches, the soft grass, the warm summer air.

Sundae, that is a beautiful poem.

Flint, your post is poetry.

Thanks. I tried to word that the way it felt.

I love lumberjim's very Silva Method technique of utilizing the right brain to set a memory hook.

Pay attention *now*. Soon, everything will change.

LJ..... sometimes you can really be inspiring. Thanks.

You take certain things with you into the future. You can surely decide which things they are. In order to save a memory, you first have to notice it.

Here I am sitting on the balcony of a hotel in Cabo San Lucas. I woke up before the sun has risen, and I'm waiting for it to come up, so I can take a good picture to post on the cellar.

Now it's 1989, and I've taken a friend to Temple University, where she will be going to college..... It's January, and we're in a stairwell, and there is a door with one of those high mounted, small square windows in it. There's a bit of grey paint on the glass, and someone has scratched the word 'illusions' into it.

I'm in the back of a furniture delivery truck at dusk, and I look out and see the sun setting over an empty field. the sky is pink fading to orange. It's October, and I can FEEL the Autumn.


Flint gets it.

The best way to take things with you into the future is to write them down. This is one of the reasons some people keep a journal.

I posted a few years ago about a practically perfect day. I still vividly remember that day. I think because I wrote about it here.

But normally I'm too lazy to keep a journal.:sniff:

at 10 :45, i decided i needed to go grill my chicken breasts for lunch tomorrow and tuesday......jinx said.....'why don't you put those plantains on the grill too?'


so, by 11PM we had chicken, Plantain, Papaya and Peaches on the grill.

So we woke the kids up and had a fine time grilling the fruit ( and one marshmallow each) and then eating them. At one point, standing in the dark by the grill, looking up at the moonlit clouds, I caught the notion that I'm good to go. If I died right now, I would be fine with it. Glad I didn't and all, but......hey......this is going into the vault.

It's always about the simple things.

Luckily I have a "vault moment" almost on a daily basis. It's my new goal in life. I used to be so full of bitterness and sorrow - Now I choose to focus on the sweet and savory.

Like those little tiny moments when Princess OTR looks me in the eye with that twinkly elfin grin, snuggles in close, and says "Mommy, know what? I love you." for no apparent reason, other than the fact that she too is content at that given moment in time.

I was recently listening to the episode of Radiolab where they discuss human memory, and in one segment a neurologist was explaining how memories are not accessed in read-only mode when we remember them...each time you recall something, the memory can be modified a little...or a lot. Over time the stored memory may be altered so heavily that it scarcely resembles the original event. Such is how two people can recall the same event with starkly contrasting stories.

The episode even discusses how fake memories can be inserted into people's minds using strong contexts. Neat stuff, but a bit unsettling.

Despite all this, we humans trust our memories, and often take great offense when the accuracy of our memories is called into question. Humans are big bags of contradictions.

I'm trying to keep a little book of good moments - maybe not daily, but trying to preserve some along the way.

The kids and I went bowling today on a whim. we had 3 hours to kill, and the boy suggested it. ( I kicked their asses ) ...but i asked at the desk when we were leaving if they sold old pins...and the girls said, no....they don't sell them, but i could have a couple for free.....

http://images2.snapfish.com/23232323...%3B42345nu0mrj

a couple more errands found us at home despot...and this thing:

http://images2.snapfish.com/23232323...36%3A345nu0mrj
then on to the real business of the day>

http://images2b.snapfish.com/2323232...3A%3B345nu0mrj

and

http://images2e.snapfish.com/2323232...47%3B345nu0mrj

What a great day. You are so fortunate to have such a beautiful family.

Thats so great. Good times, good memories...

You can really see both of you in those younguns

Beautiful post jim! I remember when I last felt that sense of contentment! I had trouble figuring out what the feeling was, then I realized: wow...I am content for this moment! I did exactly as you have suggested, I decided to contain that memory and keep it safe.

It's funny, when I consciously decide to be content it doesn't work. The moment happens of its on accord. I can tap into the feeling, but not make it manifest by imposing proper conditions.