I’ve always wanted to be able to remember all of my memories. The mere act of making a memory entails, among other neurological tidbits, going through something worth making note of and inherently remembering it. But whether it be instantly or in due time, we humans are unfortunately condemned to lock some of our memories away forever, becoming virtually incapable of retrieving them for the remainder of our lifetimes. And thus was born my fear of forgetting.
In the spirit of being honest, this fear of forgetting is coupled with lots of other fears I possess. I suffer from a fear of missing certain people or places and from a fear of losing important people in my life, just to name a few. For as long as I can remember, I’ve lived in fear of the processes my brain is automatically wired to go through. For that reason, I think I’ve subconsciously programmed my brain to resist those processes, even if they can only be resisted in the most minimal, and perhaps ineffective, ways.
I’m not sure if it counts as synesthesia, but, in my brain, memories and emotions are colorful. In an attempt to ensure that I forget the least amount of my memories, my mind has subconsciously color-coded them throughout my lifetime. Think of it as a sort of “Inside Out” situation: Every memory I can safely recall, no matter how big or small, has a color associated with it. I’d like to take you through my memory color-coding process so you can see what I mean.
Yellow is for Joy
There is a select number of memories coded under the color yellow in my brain, but it’s not because I’m a particularly unhappy person. Similar to how Joy from “Inside Out” tackles most of the movie’s situations, my yellow memories come with making the most out of any situation, especially the good ones. Yellow is reserved for memories where I recall feeling like nothing else in the world mattered except for that specific moment. These moments are special occasions that, luckily, have occurred very often. When they happen, I’m not focused on when the moment will become a memory, or whether I will even be able to remember it. I am instead wholeheartedly consumed by the intensity of the occasion, so once I think back on the memory created, it’s only fair to associate it with a color so inherently positive and joyous.
For me, yellow memories look like my 9th birthday, the first time I remember going skiing, my first day of school in the seventh grade, my grandma’s 70th birthday, the day I got into college, my last day of school my senior year, my high school graduation, my first rainy Game Day … and so many more. Yellow memories are full of the most genuine smiles, nostalgic tears and an appreciation for life so fierce that it’s hard not to want to entirely immerse oneself in the moment. I hope everyone is able to experience at least one yellow memory in their lifetime. I’m so blessed to have experienced more than I can even count.
Blue is for Sadness
Associating the color blue with sadness is a bit ironic coming from me. It’s one of the colors I feel the prettiest wearing whenever I dress for nights out, it’s my dad’s favorite color and it’s also one of the University of Michigan’s staple colors. The color as it relates to emotions, and thus memories, though, possesses an entirely different meaning in my head. Like how Sadness makes every memory she touches sad, every unhappy memory I recall is tainted by the color blue.
Blue memories are complicated to identify because I’m a big crier. I cry in almost every situation, but my tears don’t always signal sadness. Sometimes they’re tears of joy; other times they’re tears of anger. Nevertheless, my blue memories are very niche moments, like having to say goodbye to my first-ever dog, the first time I saw my parents cry, the day I realized I wouldn’t be able to see my friends for a while when COVID-19 hit, the day my grandpa died — among other dejected occasions. Some of my blue memories form as a result of very minor details in my life, while others originate from completely life-altering events. But as someone who values feeling one’s emotions to their full extent, I will eternally cherish my blue memories, no matter how sad remembering them may feel. Although these memories may remind me of moments of pure despair in my life, they also remind me of how powerful it is to feel. The ability to experience all your emotions and remember most of your memories, even the sad ones, is a blessing, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
Red is for Anger
In a similar way that I’m both a happy and a sad person, I’m also a pretty angry person. In my mind, red is the quintessential color to represent anger. It’s hot, it’s intense and, hell, it’s stereotypically associated with the emotion, so why not go with it? Much like Anger from “Inside Out,” whenever I get angry, my skin becomes cherry red, and it often begins to burn. As a result, my angry memories are kept in a red-colored capsule in my mind, there for safekeeping until any moment when I become just as angry as those memories make me, which is when I recall them to further intensify the feeling.
My red memories can be infuriating moments as simple as when my dog pees inside the house, and I have to clean it up and spray Lysol to disinfect the targeted area, or as complex as someone going behind my back and betraying my trust for superficial reasons. Red memories in my brain are ridden with the likes of that time when the College Board online system wouldn’t let me submit the test I had spent months studying for, when the washer and dryer shrink my jeans when I do laundry every other week and when my entire family was stuck in Houston for a day because of canceled flights and no one seemed to be able to help us. Looking back, most of these memories sound a bit irrational, given that I sometimes tend to become consumed with my anger and overreact in times of exasperation and distress, but that doesn’t make the feeling any less valid or real. I had a hard time digging my angry memories up because I don’t particularly enjoy recalling maddening moments. But these angry memories and emotions are a part of who I am, and I would rather be a reactive person than not react at all.
Green is for Disgust
Now, this color assignment really doesn’t make sense in my book, but my mind can’t help it. For some odd reason, green is the obvious color choice to assign to those memories that provoke utter disgust in me. It’s extremely contradictory though, because green is one of my favorite colors. Ask any of my friends: When 2023 started, I would not shut up about the fact that, in my mind, this year was the green year, no explanation needed. When it comes to feeling, expressing and remembering disgust, however, an ooey-gooey disgusting shade of green pops into my mind. Just like Disgust, whenever I recall a disgusting memory, I frown, gag and rightfully think “ew.”
My brain assigns the color green to memories as mundanely disgusting as trying a bacon-covered date for the first time, going on a deep Dr. Pimple Popper dive with a friend only to confirm exactly why I’m not built to become a doctor in the future and having to clean up a backyard full of dog poop before a family event. Nonetheless, it also assigns green to memories of social disgust, like when an acquaintance yelled at me in public without any prior motivation other than the fact they felt like it or when a friend’s significant other purposefully disrespected them and I was there to witness it. Whatever the case, I’m grateful for having memories that ignite disgust in me. It helps me identify exactly what I will and will not tolerate.
Purple is for Fear
Fear is one of the most primal and instinctive emotions humans feel. We react in fear to things unbeknownst to us, especially when they are out of our control. When my brain was going through the color options trying to identify a color to assign to fear, it landed on purple. A very close substitute to the color black (especially if it’s a dark shade of purple), purple represents fear in my mind because it makes me think of an unreachable abyss that holds all that is unknown and uncontrollable for me. In the same way that Fear jumps up in anxious surprise whenever something scares him, my mind flashes in purple lights whenever I feel fear, and the memories are guarded behind a purple shield of fearfully knowing what was once terrifying to me.
Given that most of my fear stems from uncertainty, my purple memories include events like the moments before every volleyball game of my elementary school years, every time I say goodbye to my grandparents for long periods of time, my last meal with my parents before my first college class, the preparation process for every test I’ve ever taken and every other moment in my life that has made me feel unsettled in any way. Feeling nervous and unsettled is indispensable, though. It makes feeling in control of once unprecedented situations all the more worth it.
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As you can probably tell by now, I don’t really have my emotions under control. I’m a very happy person in the same way that I sometimes feel sad, angry, disgusted and fearful. These emotions consume my life, so much so that I had to devise a system to sort my emotional memories out to avoid feeling constantly overwhelmed. The intersection of these very human emotions, however, merely serves as a representation of that very humanity. Because what is more human than to feel?
Daily Arts Writer Graciela Batlle Cestero can be reached at gbatllec@umich.edu.