There was a kid from my youth who enters my mind almost every single day. I barely knew him, but everyone knew he had the perfect hair. It was not always that way. He was not born with it. He worked on it. For a year. Throughout early 3rd grade his hair was a shattered mess. But even that early in life he knew what he had to do. I don’t know if he endeed up using gels or whatnot but by the end of grade 3 going into 4 his hair was an unqualified masterpiece. Perfectly parted in the middle, abundant waviness on both sides yet under control and not flapping in the winds. He would be surprised to know that I think of him almost every single time I shampoo and push my hair back, parted in the middle, longing to reach anything even close to what he achieved at such a young age. Sometimes I get close but mostly it’s just a frail, scraggly attempt, or maybe I could call it a tribute to the kid with perfect hair. Yeah, he’d be surprised knowing I think of him at all.
I had a friend in high school who asserted, in what contect I no longer recall, that no one would remember me. No one, he stated with a grin, had any reason to think about me or remember me in later years. He had a similar assessment of himself. He was among the best performing kids in academia at this school but he knew from an early age this was meaningless. He predicted he would grow up to be a big fat bore, and while I regret having lost touch with this individual I suspect he was probably correct in his prediction.
Who gets remembered, and how, and why? I’m just here to explain why that kid with the perfect hair still appears in my head every single day even as I barely knew him. Seemed like a nive guy.