The OGT Daily #25 Souvenirs

In French, the word for memories is souvenir. Tu me souviens? Do you remember me?  Memories are how we recall that which makes us who we are and what has meaning. Souvenirs of past lives can be held in objects, places, even bridges, and especially people. When we moved four years ago, I really needed all of my things around me to remember: This is me and I'm going to be alright.  And then there are the things I still can't find after the move which have either been forgotten (oh well!) or have literally become memories.

I worry right now that many of the things we have taken for granted in our society like due process, health care, and common decency will also become distant souvenirs of another time.

On Wednesday, when in the East Village in NY, I took this picture on 2nd Avenue between 10th and 11th street.  

It made me think of all the NYU students I was surrounded by and how Freshman college students are often homesick; still adjusting to a more independent life.  I wondered about the artist and what they were homesick for as well as how they got up there. Then I noticed the negative space of a recently demolished building and then another:

Souvenirs or ghosts of a former New York, as NYC is always changing, always evolving and can make one homesick for a slower pace that may have felt like home.  

On a brighter note, I had a real souvenir from the past later that night when I was able to Zoom into a Q & A with Tina Weymouth and Chris Franz from the Talking Heads about their movie Stop Making Sense which was just remastered and released. It was screened at RISD in Providence, where I went to school in the late 80s about ten years after Tina, Chris, and David Byrne were students there (Circa 1973). Though I could not attend the screening :( -because I was teaching at NYU, I was able to watch the Q &A as I said.

They reminisced about being students and talked about all sorts of familiar places on the RISD campus, about how the band got together, and then moved to Soho together at a time when one could get a cheap loft and how they first got started by opening for the Ramones at CBGB's near the Bowery.  Chris mentioned how the band's early rehearsals occurred in his apartment on Benefit Street in Providence and my ears perked up because that's where I had lived. Then he said right above Joe's Sandwich shop - which is exactly where I lived only it was called Jeff's in the 80s. I wondered if it could have been the same apartment because it was beautiful with big windows looking west over downtown Providence and had a huge black linoleum floor that was splatter painted just like a Jackson Pollock. 

Now that's a souvenir.

Tina Weymouth and Chris Franz 2-12-25 in Providence with a moderator (on left)

What are you grateful for today?