I'm writing a chapter on Forgetting and I began to write about floaters, the gaffes that float up in the wee small hours of the morning that make getting back to sleep so difficult. I referred to a Huxley novel where I had first learned the term so I looked up Huxley etc. and found me from a blog dated July 11, 2013. And I was wrong. I said floater was in Point Counterpoint and it wasn't; it was in Those Barren Leaves with another mention in Chrome Yellow. Oh dear, that's how errors are perpetuated.
Anyway, I corrected my blog, didn't know how to correct it on the net. It's amazing, though, how things turn up. I'm not famous, not at all, but when I refer to someone who is, they find me. Fame by reference.
Anyway, I was thinking about forgetting and it's such a huge terrifying topic that I had to procrastinate a lot while I thought about it. Today, I will try to finish it - no - round it off. There is no conclusion, is there? We go on we go on, trailing wisps and bits of vague recollections. That makes me think of Wordsworth's line, "trailing clouds of immortality." I wonder if they'll quote me quoting him? Well, if they do, I had better get it right. So I looked it up. It's from the Ode, "Intimations of Immortality" from Early Childhood, and it's quite apt.
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star, Hath had elsewhere its setting, And cometh from afar: Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory do we come From God, who is our home:
I guess it pays to be (a bit) forgetful.