may we NEVER remember

Memories are good for lessons. They are also good stuff for prisons. Greater prison none ever built than the one in between his ears.
Record keeping is good business but accounting should never take the place of manufacturing. The latter is the reason for the former. And records are for erasers and shredders.
When we say we are products of our upbringing, we’re simply saying we are prisoners of certain experiences we’ve had. And we all are. It’s a cheap prison to build. It is also very cheap to maintain. But slabs of concrete and pillars of granite do not compare. Iron bars and electric fences are nothing but sham. They are quite superficial, mere illusions. Memories far outweigh these. The man who has entered the solitary confinement of Regrets, Self-pity and Inferiority complex is the Prisoner.
And he’d rather be there than be free. A prisoner behind walls of concrete and bars of iron wants to walk home free. Not so the Prisoner. He doesn’t want to be free. He’d rather grovel in his pity and righteous indignation of his terrible mistakes. He just knows how wrong he is. And he knows such a mean person as hisself ought only to be remanded in a multi—maximum security prison. The Prisoner is such a sensible fellow. He just doesn’t want to hurt humanity with the burden of another low-life.
“If only”, the Prisoner says. If only I was smarter, a little taller and a wee bit nicer. If only I was Mother Theresa with a little Mohammed Ali and perhaps a pinch of Hitler. If only I was… If only the Prisoner would open up the door. If only he would rather be stupid than smart. If everybody was smart what would geniuses and Nobel prizes be for?
“If only” is not a Martian. ‘If only” is the lady next door who chose to commute the sentence she gave herself and walk free. “If only” is the kid disobedient to the sensible voice telling him nobody wants to hear a smart punk any way. “If only” is doing it, although the Professor from Wharton knows you’re going to fail at it any way. If only is walking out that prison door.
May we never remember we grazed our knuckles learning to drive a train. May we never remember the resolution to ignore the mail-man that was broken after long months of hard labour. May we never remember the leash holding us glued to Pityland, St. Failuresburg. May we never remember we are so like the circus elephant. It is held by a pole at childhood.  It struggles with the pole and doesn’t get free. After months of experimenting, it discovers with empirical proof that it cannot move the pole. Then the baby elephant also forgets to remember it is growing. It just remembers to remember it is held by a super-human pole. He is another prisoner to fact.
The Prisoner will no longer try. He has discovered there’s no point trying. He will fail. The walls are too heavy and the bars are made of the finest steel. He just can’t get out. Such a sensible fellow, the Prisoner is.
But the journey is also something. The means is an end in itself. And the fact that you who were dumb at birth has learnt to turn at the honk of any car is proof that you are indeed stupid. But you’re stupid enough to merit a place on the earth, stupid enough to keep trying. Failure is a fact. And memories of facts flush easily. That’s the reason for the loo. Try it every now and then.
The guy who forgets the night has not done well. The dream and the journey to the dream are priceless. We sing songs of night.
I have asked the Prisoner to open wide the gates and step away from solitary confinement and from the prison of self-doubt. I have asked him to sing again. And to dance.