Of Music and Memoirs

"Memory is a very strange thing. You can create memories, you know. I could make you remember this moment forever. All I have to do is mark it in some way, you'll never forget it."




For people, great and worst memories always leave a mark no matter what. We have this tendency to hold on to or let go of experiences.


Memories play a key role on how you see yourself today. Like an awkward caterpillar cocooning to become the most marvelous butterfly.


A person's life book consists of hundreds and thousands of pages full of simple, extraordinary, grandiose events that took place.


If one would ask, how would one know if they are worth keeping? 


Ah yes, the inevitable question of memory retention. It's as basic as these: 


Some would remember names far more numerous than all the countries of the world.


Some would reminisce through unique smells of the sweet, the pungent, the aromatic, the nauseating or the flavorful.


Some would feel nostalgic of places, yes, places where dinner dates, movie dates and dates that go three hours full were held.


Some would trail back using music, the heart-felt and vulnerable moments.


Music had always been how I get in touch with the past. It is when a particular music would be randomly played and my mood would be altered through hearing the song. It is when a specific music would be aired over the radio and suddenly you felt sad of what had happened. It is when that one song you would love to hear but forgot the title would eventually be played and for a mere four minutes, you were engulfed. Enthralled.


Countless experiences had been revisited thanks to songs playing over and over again. Even if you don't know the artist, even if you don't know the title of the song, even if you don't know the lyrics but that tune, that familiar tune made you realize of someone, some thing, some time.


From those Christmas family reunions you had to cousins having a good time at a bar to some arranged birthday party at a hotel in Pasig. Those, those absolutely treasured memories were stored because of the music played during the events.


The overwhelming truth of degeneration may wake us one time and provide us with vague, shadowed and blurred pasts.

Humans want to get the best out of life but we all know it is an impossibility even if we try our best to be righteous, patient, truthful, loyal, eager, punctual, flexible, religious plus other positive virtues one can think of. But we can have the best. Sure, memories may be bittersweet for most. Life could incline more to be unfair than fair.

Nonetheless, music is here to stay to remind us how we truly are and what we truly were.


"I could make myself immortal in you." - Fabian, The Amnesia Clinic