Google Trends serves up... Ocracoke Island (and a bit about memory)

It's 11:04 a.m. and the hottest search on Google trends is... Ocracoke Island.  Presumably, this is because the island is expected to be hammered by Hurricane Irene as it moves up the east coast.

I have fond, if vague, memories of Ocracoke Island.  Years ago, my family used to go camping at Cape Hatteras in the Outer Banks of North Carolina.  We got down to Ocracoke Island once or twice.  Honestly, though, all I remember of the place is that there were giant horseflies there.  That, and I remember hearing something about horses.

It's odd.  All of my earliest memories are bad ones.  Being bitten by giant horseflies at Ocracoke Island.  Losing my grip on my E.T. balloon and having it drift up to the top of the high ceiling in the living room.  Having my toy truck thrown into the parking lot by a bigger kid outside the family apartment and crying because I wasn't allowed to go get it and I thought it was gone forever.  I don't know what was so compelling about the tiny miseries of being a tiny person, but they're seared into my memory.

As I got older, though, something changed.  I think it was sometime during early college.  It was a slow change, but the most enduring and powerful memories of my adult life are the positive ones.  These days, unpleasant memories tend to go through a refining process in which they're rendered down intellectually to extract any lessons or other useful information they might contain.  Any lingering emotional fallout fades away for lack of anything to anchor it to, and I'm just left with an intellectual understanding of what happened.  By contrast, if I want to call up the memory of late night improvisational frisbee golf with a good friend, or a cherry-blossom viewing party with BBQ on a perfect spring day in Kyoto, all I have to do is close my eyes, let my mind drift back, and there I am.

If I knew more about psychology, I'm certain I could put some names to what changed and what it is that I do now.  But I don't, and I can't.  And honestly, I couldn't care less.  It works well.  If it ever stops working, I'll change it to something better.  That's it for today.

The orbit's starting to drift wider.  I can feel it!