As Mitch and Matt lay in the darkness in Louis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 living room on the lumpy sleeper sofa, Mitch tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable. Matt had passed out the moment his head touched the pillow but Mitch was having trouble getting to sleep. Eventually his movement roused Matt.
\n“What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s wrong, Mitch?” Matt asked sleepily.
\n“Oh, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s nothing,” Mitch replied.
\n“No, I can tell there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s something bothering you.”
\n“Really, don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t worry about it.”
\n“Mitch, c\u00e2\u20ac\u2122mon. This is Matt here. You can tell me anything.”
\n“Oh, alright,” Mitch relented. “I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m worried I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t lock the front door of my house when we left.”
\n“That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s it?” Matt laughed. “That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bothering you?”
\n“It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a very valid worry,” Mitch said. “Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t laugh at me.”
\n“But Mitch, we all watched you lock your front door. You had each of us sign an affidavit attesting to the fact that we had witnessed the locking of the door and had tested the security of the door and that, to the best of our knowledge, the door was locked.”
\n“I know, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just –”
\n“And then you had pictures taken of you locking the door. And you had a large banner made up stating that the door was indeed locked and you made smaller, keychain-sized versions made as well and gave one to each of us.”
\n“I know, Matt but –”
\n \t“And then you recorded yourself saying, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcI locked the door. I locked the door,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 over and over again, hundreds of times and you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been playing that tape on your Walkman the whole time we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been gone.”
\n\t“I know, I know, Matt. And still I think about it all the time. Locking the door is such an automatic, brainless act and I forced it into the realm of the conscious. In fact, by calling so much attention to it, I forced it into the super-conscious. And now I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m doubting that it ever happened.”
\n\t“What?” Matt asked, confused.
\n\t“Yeah, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know if it ever happened of if my brain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just fooling me into thinking that it happened.”
\n\t“I was there, Mitch,” Matt said. “Trust me, it happened. And it was pretty sad, too.”
\n\t“How do I know you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not making that up?”
\n\t“Why would I do that? Cripes, Mitch. You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re off your rocker. Good night.”
\n\t“No, seriously Matt. How do I know you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not just making this whole story up? And that my memory of locking the door has been placed in my head through the power of suggestion? That is to say that simply by hearing your repeated telling of the story of the locking of my door, it has actually become a memory of my own.”
\n\t“What about the banner? The photos? The cassette?”
\n\t“Props? Fakes? Figments? What is memory, anyway? What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s your earliest memory, Matt?” Mitch asked.
\n\tMatt thought about it for a moment and then replied, “Throwing up on my mom at a black-tie dinner at the United Nations when I was two years old.”
\n\t“Are you sure?”
\n\t“Sure, I remember it like it was yesterday.”
\n\t“Isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t that the sort of story your mom might tell over and over again?” Mitch asked.
\n\tMatt snorted, “C\u00e2\u20ac\u2122mon, Mitch. You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve met my mom. Does she seem like the type of woman who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d tell an amusing anecdote about being puked on in front of Boutros-Boutros Gali?”
\n\t“Now that you mention it, no, she doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t. But it is the sort of story that you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d tell. Especially every time someone says the U.S. should pay its late fees for its U.N. membership. You love telling that story.”
\n\t“What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s your point?”
\n\t“Well, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve told the story so much, and you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve hear me tell it a few times, and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m sure you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve got other friends you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve heard tell it.”
\n\t“Sure. And?”
\n\t“Well, how do you know it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a real memory and not just a story? Is there actual recollection of an event or are you just remembering a retelling?”
\n\t“Wow, Mitch. I think I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m starting to see your point. You don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know if you remember locking your door or if you remember a story in which you locked your door.”
\n\t“Exactly,” replied Mitch. “And therefore, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m having trouble sleeping.”
\n\t“Well now I am too,” said Matt.
\n\t“How come?” asked Mitch.
\n\t“Because I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m worried that I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t plug the drain in the houseboat and the whole thing\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to be underwater when we get back.”
\n\t“That would suck.”
\n\t“Tell me about it,” Matt replied sadly.
\n\t“Wanna play flashlight tag?” Mitch asked.
\n\t“Would I ever!” Matt exclaimed.
\n\t“Keep it down out there!” Louis shouted from his bedroom. “I gotta work in the morning!”
\n\t“Sorry, Louis!” Matt and Mitch said together.
\n\tEven though they were forced to muffle their cries of glee and delight, it was the best game of flashlight tag either man had ever played.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As Mitch and Matt lay in the darkness in Louis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 living room on the lumpy sleeper sofa, Mitch tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable. Matt had passed out the moment his head touched the pillow but Mitch was having trouble getting to sleep. Eventually his movement roused Matt. “What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s wrong, Mitch?” Matt asked sleepily. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/588\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.illinoir.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}