Notes v. photos

While I was in San Francisco last week, I flipped through the small memo notebook I take to every conference I work at. I use the thing to jot down the important stuff that gets said in my meetings with conference chairs. Toward the end of my old notes was this:

Silver van

30923

5:00 am

The note confused me for a moment. Why would I have written down vehicle information like that, including the license plate number? Then it dawned on me that this was the van that picked me up from my hotel in Shanghai early last November to take me to the airport to fly to Korea. The co-organizers of the conference had offered to arrange my transportation, and this was the info they gave me the night before I left. 

Seeing this note brought a warm smile to my face. It recalled the memory so vividly. I remembered Chaoyang calling his driver to arrange it, I remembered scribbling the note, I remembered the anxiety I felt that something would go wrong and I’d miss my flight.

Of all the photos I took on that trip, I don’t think a single one is as evocative as this note was. The thing about photos is that they take you out of the moment. They have to be contemplated, composed, posed, and shot. You’re thinking ahead of time that this will be a keepsake you will use to remember the moment. I find that when I look at my old photos, I remember very little of what it actually felt like to be there. They don’t put me back in my own skin. What was I doing when that photo was taken? Well, I was either clicking the button or I was looking at the lens and trying to smile. There’s not much in that (I don’t think) to attach a memory to.  

A little note like the one I found, though, is all about the moment. I intended it only for immediately practical purposes. It was filling a need I had right then and there. And it also involved some actual doing on my part. So when I stumbled upon it last week, it took me right back to that moment. It did this more effectively than a photo would have, because the note actually had a place in the sequence of events that day. It had relevance for my actions.

A photo is a moment taken out of context. I enjoy looking at them—they can be intriguing—but they give no sense of what came before or next. My stupid little van note’s entire reason for existence was to give a sense of what was coming next. That added context lets me slip back into the thoughts and feelings I had when I was there. 

My note might also be so evocative partly because I never intended to remember it. Last week was the first I had seen it in two and a half months. My photos from that trip, on the other hand, I looked at right after I took. I sorted through them on my computer, shared them with friends and family, gave them captions on Picasa. I was so consumed in them so soon after the fact that when I look at them now I’m not sure if I’m remembering the events themselves or if I’m remembering telling people about them. Maybe I would enjoy my photos more if I left them unviewed for three months after taking them. Remembering is more fun when you’ve given yourself a little time to forget.