Don't mind the gaps

No one remembers every single detail of their life. But gather a few old friends, and the past starts to piece itself back together

- SEEMA GOSWAMI

Memory is a funny thing. Two people may have the same experience, but ask them about it many years down the line and they will remember it completely differently. It's as if the brain selects elements that are important to you, retains them, and deletes everything else as extraneous. So, no two people can ever have the same recall of an experience they went through together.

I thought of this again recently when the classmates of my English Honours course in Loreto College, Calcutta (as it then was), formed a WhatsApp group to stay in touch, update each other on our lives, and plan reunions for the future. Sadly, soon after we formed the group, our formidable principal, Sister Maeve Hughes, passed away. So we shared her obituaries and chatted about our interactions with her in college.