Hi Friends,
This is not my typical substack post—which is usually just to let you know I have a new piece or book out (ha ha ha, that’s going to be awhile). But I was noodling on something this morning for which I don’t really have a place, so maybe, even though it’s off-brand, you’ll indulge me?
I’ve been thinking about memory.
I think about memory a lot after witnessing my father go through dementia during the final years of his life. What stayed. What disappeared. There were so many things we had to let go of, little griefs in preparation for the ultimate one. Losing him bit by bit, but also thinking about how much we depend on our parents to be the keepers of who we once were. There is part of your childhood that goes when they do (assuming you had that kind of relationship, but maybe even if you didn’t) and since my dad’s death, my own memories of my early years feel somehow more distant. We kept that history together, my parents and I.
I am also thinking about memory because, at the recommendation of my ol’ pal Dan Wilson, I just finished Kazuo Ishiguro’s fairytale of a novel, The Buried Giant. It’s set in post-Arthurian England where a mist caused by a dragon’s breath has made everyone forget the past, both collectively and personally. As fragments return to the main characters, an elderly couple, the reader wonders: would they be better off never knowing? They are happy, loving: if their memories were restored would that continue?
That is all serious stuff, the contemplations of someone who is getting older (and is also desperately trying to avoid writing aforementioned book ha ha ha ha ha). But today I was hit by a more amusing recollection, one that I hadn’t exactly forgotten, but hadn’t thought about in years and sent me down a rabbit hole. It was triggered by watching Andrew McCarthy’s documentary Brats on Hulu.
The film is about the impact on a group of young actors of being part of the 1980s so-called “Brat Pack.” It catapulted me back to my early 20s: living in an apartment in NYC at the bottom of an airshaft across from a crack house and working as a typist at Esquire magazine. Sometimes I got to write short squibs of “house copy”: mostly gossipy Hollywood business stories (no byline; no additional pay beyond my whopping $13,500 salary), and one day my boss asked me to go check out a group of young actors who were in the upcoming movie St. Elmo’s Fire. They were just days away from being given their notorious sobriquet by David Blum (who, as it happened, also worked at Esquire when I started there, but was older—at least 27--and had a real job).
I had never met a celebrity in person and was so very nervous. That morning, I put on my one dress—a blue and white striped, full-skirted Norma Kamali frock that was an older friend’s cast-off and way too big, making me look like a toddler playing dress up—tried on multiple pairs of shoes and headed to the office. Climbing the stairs out of the subway—so I had already walked five blocks to 110th and Broadway, descended into the station and ridden all the way to 34th street—something felt…off. I looked down and realized I was wearing two different shoes, and not only two different shoes but a pump and a flat. My head spun and my stomach dropped, like I was free-falling backwards. How did I do that!?!?
Luckily, my friends and I tended to keep spare outfits in our bottom desk drawers because, at 22, you never knew what could happen, and someone had a pair of bone colored pumps in just my size. So off I went to a hotel—don’t recall which one—somewhere on the East Side.
My memories of the group: Judd Nelson was carrying around Christopher Durang’s Beyond Therapy; when I asked what he thought he sniffed with true John Bender disdain and said he never commented on a book until he’d read it at least twice. Demi Moore and I giggled over diet colas at the bar bonding over how weird it was to be so young and in such a fancy room; I told Andrew McCarthy that he looked terrified, which I’m sure he appreciated (not). I never did end up writing anything, but it was a fun afternoon.
If I was asked to go to an event like that now—which I wouldn’t be and even if I were would decline—I’d wear jeans and not give a damn. I’ve changed. Based on the film, I guess they have, too.
Though I might still wear mismatched shoes.
What’s your relationship to memory?
Hahaha!! A flat and a pump. Ain't anxiety grand?
I love this, Peggy! By the way, wasn't that Andrew McCarthy thing super-weird? Made me like Demi Moore, though, so I'm not surprised about the co-giggling. Please write more like this!