past decay

My memories are out of focus. During high school, I worked overtime at the ice cream cone factory so I could buy an old VW bug and a Minolta SLR camera. The first trick I learned was to smear Vaseline on a UV filter to make everything dream-like in my photographs. I was displeased with the results and felt I’d wasted a good UV filter. I don’t remember why or how the images turned out, but I imagine they resembled memories. At least my memories. No matter how hard I try, my memories are grainy, fragmented, and out of focus. I’m speaking of image memories, not facts, events, relationships, or embarrassing moments. Those things are clear. But, when I try to create a recalled image in my mind, it’s always distorted. That bothers me. I’ve seen a lot of things I’d like to see again with perfect clarity. Then again, maybe I don’t want that at all. Maybe the Vaseline-smeared recollections are more interesting because they are not perfectly clear.