Looking back in time can be a mysterious undertaking. It’s a little like being a detective in your own private mystery story. While we would like to believe that our memory of prior events is accurate, even the clearest of minds can distort the past. We painstakingly search for the clues that will aid us in recovering the secrets of our past: the Who, the What, the When, the Where, and the always elusive Why. Ideally, we would prefer that our past fit neatly into our own self-narrative and, to the extent that it does not, the mind has a convenient way of whitewashing and even erasing any incongruities. This the mind will often rationalize for the sake of our sanity, sense of morality, or perhaps to protect our fragile hearts. If we are unaware of such trickery, we may be able to go through life without shame, regret, or remorse over prior transgressions, and without conscious awareness of painful experiences. On our mind’s side is time. The more time that passes, the hazier the unpleasantness becomes, until finally the unpleasantness is–well–gone. Or so it would seem.

For some memories are never truly forgotten. They simply lie dormant until the right person comes along to revive them.

For Jennifer Bantam, today was that day.