Nearing the end of first semester.

Two more weeks and the front half of the school year is in the books, cooked, and done for. Five months in with only five months left to go before summer vacation. The life I live is cyclical, and I have the same or similar thoughts each year. I though Deja vu was for more immediate feelings of sameness and not because I have the same reoccurring thoughts year after year! So odd.

Sometimes when I’m reading a physical book I get a sense of out of place deva ju on how the pages feel in my hands. The weight of the book on my elbows, and the kink in my neck from looking down. I think that physical memory comes from university, and not childhood.

I don’t remember all that much about childhood, beyond being sick in my teens, and a few fights where I got beat up by older brothers. I remember a Christmas when my brother Steve got the GI Joe snow truck I desperately wanted, and I got the Sargeant Slaughter tank he wanted, but he wouldn’t trade as it turned out the truck was the far superior toy (as I most certainly knew it was when asking for said truck!). That I recall clear as day. I recall getting pushed down the stairs, on several occasions (top set, and basement set) not on the same day mind you, but by the same brother. Ha. Kids. I remember proms, school dances, school plays, the band practice where the school knob end bashed in the rear tire of my Eddie Bauer street racing bike. But I don’t really remember much about just being a kid. A few baseball games on the driveway, walking about town during day camp, one visit to the beach during a heavy wind storm where the waves were the largest I’d ever seen in person. Some snippets of theme parks, like a giant indoor vertical slide made of wood, with a rope ladder used to climb up, and massive padded bags at the bottom to stop you after the descent. I remember being scared to death of my uncle’s german Shepherd Carla, who would growl at me when I needed to walk passed it in the front hall to use the toilet. Is the lack of memory a trauma response? Probably.

Makes me wonder what my kids will remember for childhood as they grow older. Hard to interpret what will become a core memory in the end, and what is just fluff to be discarded by the brain.

It’s Friday today. I sent off my first big report for the year last night, so hopefully that will be free and clear of mistakes and I can shoot off an invoice, the first for 2024! I think I might watch The Creator today as a reward. I finally sat down the other day to watch Oppenheimer with my wife. It was good, I liked it. Brought the book to life. Glad I watched it at home, I had the subtitles on, and loads of bathroom breaks. I even rewatched TMNT Mutant Mayhem the other day just for shits & giggles. Still as good as ever. I do like where Sony Animation has been able to go recently, especially when you think about Spider-Verse as well. Truly great stuff. I’m pumped for their third and final installment, probably sometime around 2026.