Celebrating Memory on Memorial Day
I forgot it was Memorial Day for a second. How ironic! Memory is not one my strengths, but it took on a special significance today. I'm watching a live stream of my hometown getting washed away for the second time in 2 years. Elliott City, MD: That's where I went to my first homecoming, where I had my first open mic, where I stayed up late sucking straws at Greater Maryland's only decent bars. I'll always remember the way that place was, even when it becomes something else.
The other thing I want to remember is Dylan Meyer, a comedian who just passed away. I ran into him at open mics and always saw his name popping up in the Baltimore comedy scene's infamous Facebook debates, but I never got to enjoy him personally. Luckily memory isn't an objective recording of events, it's a series of stories we tell ourselves, and you all told some great stories about Dylan. Now I feel like I know him too.
It's hard to know what the purpose of this whole shabang is, when cities and amazing comedians can wash away in the blink of an eye. But something endures. Those fucking memories. When I lost my dad, my cousin, my grandmother, my god parents, my friends, when I was forced to pack up and leave my home year after year growing up, I realized that you not only carry people and places with you, you carry them inside of you. They become you. Even people you've never met. That imprint will LITERALLY be carried on to the next generation, and the next, and the next, until we're all half robot/half alien from centuries of interstellar interbreeding. That means these people and places are still REAL, still LIVING, and they'll never stop. That's what keeps me optimistic. Everything we do matters, and it always will.
