THE MEMORY PLAYS DIRTY TRICKS

Antonin Kosík

The memory plays dirty tricks. What would life be without memory? What would it be like? Sometimes our hearts sink when we remember a lost battle a long time ago, and at other times we eagerly anticipate, though also with fear, places previously unknown to us. Often we can't remember the train departure time or we forget the date of our own wedding. Did we really get married? Was it not a dream? And at other times we can't stop things from going round in our heads: Seven seven zero twenty two, seven seven zero twenty two, seven seven... It feels as though we are not in full control of our own memory. And yet...
As an example, in some Moravian and Hungarian villages the locals have a strange custom. When they reach adulthood, when they are of marriageable age, they start going to the pub, where it is normal to get incredibly drunk and then get badly beaten up. The next day, when they wake up, they can't remember anything. They have an empty head, but empty of truth, a broken nose and bruises under their swollen eyes. When they finally get up, they eat a pickled gherkin and throw cold water over their dishevelled hair and go to the pub again, where their elders repeatedly tell them, again and again, nonstop, about all of the previous day's events. They swell with pride and start to mistake these stories for their own memories. Life goes on. They happily drink until they are unconscious and take beatings.
Shortly before the wedding, the Moravian villager enjoys a rich store of memories from his past and some kind of image of his future. At his own wedding he gets really drunk and the next day discovers that he remembers nothing. But he doesn't have a broken nose or bruises under his swollen eyes. He has become a man. He throws cold water over his head and eats a pickled gherkin. Then he goes to the pub. His gaze is drawn to the youngsters with purple bruises under their swollen eyes and broken noses. An uncomfortable memory quietly enters his head. He sits down. He tells the boys what they did the previous day.
Yes. This way of life naturally preserves basic values, reinforces respect for elders and married people, and those that we need to listen to open-mouthed side by side, for us to be able to find out what happened yesterday, last year or even ten years ago.