Memory as the space in which a thing happens for a second time.

and other Paul Auster inspired exercises

This week I’m living retrospectively through my camera roll in order to explore this compulsion of mine to document every living moment through a photo. The goal of the exercise if to find connections between moments—connections that usually go unnoticed.
Discovering these lost connections allows for a reconfiguration of reality, the creation of that space in which a thing happens for a second time. Paul Auster brilliantly explored these coincidences on his book “The Invention of Solitude.”

So here I go:

There was rain that filtered through the envelope sitting on my front porch, waiting to be picked up. The envelope contained a wet masters diploma.

It was that same rain that allowed for mushrooms to grow on my front lawn.

and hydrangeas to bloom in my mom’s garden, which she ignored the previous home owner had planted.

It was that same rain that allowed for marigolds and petunias to proliferate in my backyard.

There was my daughter’s vomit which covered this otherwise pristine linen shorts.

There was liquid in the form of paint on this piece I got from my dear artist friend Makenzie Heinemann.

There was a nondescript body of water as a backdrop on this Gabriela Hearst look from her new resort collection.

There was more rain that threatened an otherwise uneventful al fresco late lunch in our backyard.

There was water about to erupt from clouds on this open field in the middle of nowhere, where we imminently stopped to release our charged bladders during a road trip last weekend.

——

Isn’t life about meaningless, sometimes inconsequential, yet fascinating hidden connections?