Kurt Braunohler

Day 9

NOTE: This is not a continuation from day 8 – I’m going to wait until a card comes along that pushes me to finish that story.

“The most important thing is the thing most easily forgotten.”

Finally! One that I understand! What is the most easily forgotten thing?

I actually have a pretty terrible memory. They say that your subconscious mind remembers everything, but your conscious mind lacks the ability to access it properly. I wish I could figure out how to remember more things from my past. I have forgotten so much.

An Incomplete List of Things I’ve forgotten:

how to play the piano

how to play the guitar

how to play the saxophone

all my friends’ phone number from high school

all but one of my friends’ phone numbers from my pre-cellphone days, except for one – Damien’s, wait, fuck! I only know half of it now.

All the math I ever learned

Proust’s “The Swan’s Way” (Ironic, I know!)

The name of every teacher I ever had in elementary school except for two – First grade - Mrs. High Horse (I’m not kidding. She was married to a native guy.) and Mrs. Ritchie

 The names of the twins I dated in 6th grade. I THINK their last name was English – because I seem to recall referring to them collectively as the English Twins. They were from Ocean Grove. I would date one, then she would break up with me, and her sister would ask me out at the same time. It was fine with me because I honestly could not tell them apart. I touched one of their boobs. It was at a showing of Dirty Dancing at the Bradley Beach cinema. I had taken her sister to see the same movie at the same theatre the week prior. I wish I could remember their names.

Everything I learned as a boy scout.

The plot of every book I read in high school.

The names of most of the girls I kissed in high school.

Every conversation I had at lunch in high school.

All the phone numbers I had before my current number.

Most jokes I think of

Every baseball game, basketball game, and soccer game I ever played growing up. Not a single specific memory. Just a general feeling of dislike.

All the bumper stickers on my first car (there were a lot), except for one: I had bought a “Question Authority” bumper sticker, but I cut off the “Authority” and painted “Yourself”. So I drove around with a bumper sticker that said “Question Yourself”. Man I was unbearable.

Close to every scene I improvised over 8 years of improvising almost every night of the week. Except for a handful. I remember my first scene. And maybe 4 or 5 others. That’s it.

The names and faces of every single person I worked with at Jersey Mike’s Subs in Wall, NJ, the Avon Pavilion on the boardwalk, Nifty Fifties Diner in Baltimore, or the Hopkins library.

I don’t even remember the name of the coffee shop I worked at when I first moved to Brooklyn in 1998.

The name of the lunatic tow-truck driver I had to repeatedly call to tow the piece of shit 1979 Vespa I bought when I was 24.

The names of the boys who lived next door to me growing up (at the house my mom called “the druggies house”) who I played with a lot.

The brand of the used, single-fin surfboard my mom bought me for Christmas when I was 14 years old. I loved that board. I also forgot what happened to it. Where did it go?

The names of most people I meet.