Déjà Vu

The human brain is a fascinating thing. All of who we are - memories, personality, perceptions - it's all stored up there in that gray matter, held together by synapses and neurons. Science has yet to fully understand it, but there's no need really... we go on day after day, and it just does what it does without us giving a thought (ironically enough) to what it's doing. Admittedly, though, it is mystifying, and once in a while something will happen up there that draws our attention back to it... and makes us go "wow... what is that?"

There have been two times in my life that I've experience what you might call a "flood of emotion" - an unsuspected, unanticipated emotional release triggered by some catalyst that stirred a painful memory. The first time I remember it happening was 2008. I was in the movie theater watching The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - not an amazing film, for me - but while I watched, something happened. If you haven't seen it, essentially there's a man who ages backwards... and it's weird... but very subtly throughout the movie, the impending approach of Hurricane Katrina is just sort of looming in the background. It's not a major theme in the movie or even a topic of conversation for the most part... it's just... there. Cleverly enough, they sprinkled the film with actual news clips of local weathermen and news anchors in New Orleans discussing Katrina's imminent landfall. Again, so subtly... playing, for example, on the TV in the background at a hospital. But as we watched, I thought to myself, "Oh my God... that's [so-and-so] from Channel 6... I think I remember that actual newscast." It wasn't entirely unnerving. It was just a little bit of a strange sensation.

So I'm casually watching the movie, perplexed by the plot, but still floating along with it, taking the ride. And then it happened. What the final scene of the movie doesn't show is the forceful and destructive Hurricane Katrina swallowing my city whole. No, what it shows is a gentle tide of water slowly creeping into a room (a garage maybe?), enveloping a clock which is sitting upright on the floor. It could have been any little flood. The water just trickled into the room... and as it did, I came completely undone. There were 2 people sitting behind me that I knew, and I was so unraveled by that final frame that I couldn't even turn to tell them goodbye. I rushed out of the back exit of the theater, heaving sobs all the way, and I could not fully understand what had happened to me. One minute I was fine, and the next, well... "not fine" would be the understatement of the century.

I suppose my brain had tied together all of those little bits (the news reports in the background, the scenes from around the city...) while I wasn't paying much attention so that by the time the water came into that room, and it was understood where it was coming from, that brain of mine recognized that this was associated with a very painful memory. And I lost my shit.

That was the first time.

The second time was yesterday evening. 

Buddy and I were talking as he drove, and what I saw when I looked straight ahead did not make sense. I saw headlights pointed at us. I’ve reflected before on the dissonance between what you perceive versus what is real. It’s a phenomenon that absolutely fascinates me. It took my brain a moment to figure out what was happening, and once it did, I pointed ahead and said to Buddy, "What is that? Wha- wha- what's he doing??" and the clueless driver turned off onto a street just in front of us...

Nothing happened. No close call really, no accident, no slamming on brakes. And I. lost. it. Heaving sobs again, couldn't catch my breath, couldn't speak a word. I was overcome with emotion. But why? It was a mildly scary non-event... But I was left to figure out why my brain and body were reacting this way. Almost like a typical action-reaction emotional response in reverse. Usually you perceive something, it has an effect, you react, right? Not this time. It was react... and then figure out what I was reacting to. It only took about 30 seconds to put it together...

See, 10 years ago I was the passenger in a vehicle with my best friend forever. And on that fateful day, as we listened to Ben Folds sing "I ammm... I ammm... I amm... the luckiest..." (how's that for irony?), I experienced something similar. A truck neither of us had seen was barreling toward the 89 Honda Accord we rode in as we crossed the intersection we were at. I saw it, and after the moment it took for my brain to figure out what it was seeing, I reached up and pointed and said, "Hey... look..."

*BAM*

Lights out. I don't remember a thing - even the impact - until after the paramedics were already on the scene. I heard screeching tires but saw nothing.

We were fine, thankfully. Though by the looks of the crumpled car we were in, you could say it was a miracle. 

The bottom line is that those experiences shade everything that comes into our sensory organs and goes through processing by the brain. While I'd mostly forgotten the terror of that accident, and while on a regular basis I can make it through the day without recalling the grief associated with Hurricane Katrina, those little triggers can be fired off randomly, unexpectedly, and take us completely off guard. 

How amazing and powerful is that brain of ours. There's no "figuring it out." Who we are is in there, and while we may be able to tuck those memories away and lock them up, our brain does not always let us forget. That could be perceived as a bad thing; I say, though, thank goodness. It's our own backup of ourselves.

Albert Einstein said, "Memory is deceptive because it is colored by today's events." I won't go so far as to say I think Einstein was wrong. I do think that it's true in reverse as well, though. Today's events are colored by our memories. This doesn't just apply to traumatic experiences, but anything that provokes an emotional reaction. It's a good practice to ask the question, "Why am I reacting this way?" You might end up in a therapeutic counseling session with yourself. ;)

*1/26/13 Edit: A friend of mine (who is a trained therapist) offered this insight (click the picture to view larger):