These memories, which are my life—for we possess nothing certainly except the past—were always with me.
—Evelyn Waugh
I don't think love should make you feel uneasy. When you feel sick, I don't think that's love—that's infatuation.
—Alexa Chung
I'm sitting in a dark, chilly room in Maine in early September.
But Tuesday it was hot when I went up to the attic with a box of cheap cards and two large rolls of Christmas wrapping paper.
I paused by the box of little red books, then decided to see if I could find 1983—the oldest one.
It was there, so I flipped the yellowed pages to August. I thought it might have been the 15th, but there's no mention of him on that date.
I pass the 20th, the 25th, then I'm at the end of the month.
And there the little boxed episode appears at the bottom of the page on August 31—which is today, 38 years ago.
The coincidence of looking at this entry on this particular day spooks me, reminds me that my attempts to decommission the memory, to cool it sufficiently so that it could be safely handled, are themselves an error of survival—of age: pardonable but nevertheless inaccurate.
I wore a boys size cardigan sweater umpire-striped in forest green and cream. I still have the jeans, faded sky-blue, that I wore that night.
The meeting after a long bar night was promising but not magical—that was yet to come, perhaps when I accepted his invitation to a housewarming party or, more likely, that first evening sitting on the futon in that room.
That room. 1719 Spruce Street, Philadelphia.
Third floor.
