Sustainability and Memory

SUSTAINABILITY AND MEMORY

This article is an attempt to express how the approach of sustainability (or frugal living) is related to the feelings of memory, belonging and in the creation of our personal identities and what role it plays in modern lifestyle.

My parent’s and grandparent’s generation grew up in the period of just means. Nothing was abundant or in plentiful and it became a necessity to use each and everything sparingly, to its fullest possible utility, even surpassing the life cycle of the material itself. If the material wasn’t fit for use in its present form, then it used to be ingeniously transformed (or reused) into something else, till another such cycle of transformation came about and the process continued.  Take for example a simple shawl or a light blanket. The shawl would be used by my grandparents, then successively passed on to my parents and probably, if the condition was good enough, it could come all the way to me. It is with everything – from best shirts to photo frames, to cooking utensils. It is quite amazing to see that many of our households have a collection of what can be termed as vintage collection of cooking ware, linens, woollen ware, gadgets, pens, letters, writing desks, sewing machines, toys, dolls, bats, rackets, and books and so on. They are all, what I call as ‘memory banks’. They perform the same role, as a loving letter that my father has written to me a couple of times. They denote the same care and love, as you glance through your photo album and recall the moments that you had spent as a child with your extended family. Although the old dusty, cranky, heavy, oxidized copper cooking ware would have now been replaced by the sleek, shiny, light stainless steel, people prefer to keep the old cooking utensils in loft areas and mentally in one of the compartments of their minds. The old and heavy copper cooking ware utensil, now redundant, reminds my parents about the delicious dishes that were cooked and cherished along with the children and which created some special moments of togetherness. The defunct technology of heating water by using copper cylindrical drum and coils, replaced by geysers and consecutively by solar panels, reminds my father and his siblings of their childhood and the quarrels and laughter that they had shared in the bathroom or the shout that they experienced from their mother for lazing around in the bathroom. Herein I wish to highlight a connection – the economic necessity of perpetual use of a particular item results in forming a relation with that object. The relationship deepens as more and more of our existential moments are spent with the object of use and enriches as more people get associated with the same object. Memories of the people in this way get inter connected with the same object and result in highly nostalgic dialogues when people meet after a gap of time. The object already surpasses its primary role of utility and gets highly ‘value’ ridden. The memories, emotions get recalled as long as the object is with you. The object, without us being conscious of it, has already become a part of our consciousness that defines our identities. It is this effect of association that compels people in a country like India, to retain such objects long after they might not have any utilitarian value. Sometimes, long after children have grown up and their woollen ware cannot fit them, such items are reused and transformed into woollen socks or woollen scarfs. The form of the object might have changed, but the memory lingers as one sees the socks again.

Another aspect of sustainability is to do things by ourselves. In frugal conditions, there is no subletting of jobs. We build our own houses; we cook food ourselves because we cannot afford to sublet it. But, building a house together as a group of people introduces numerous instances of interactions and lively encounters. There is hardship no doubt, but collective moments are spent, one shares one’s life secrets as one is engaged in plastering or painting a wall and the entire process gets a high emotional quotient.  Later on, as one touches the finished wall or leans on it or looks at it, these memories surge back in mind. The wall might be slightly off-aligned or there might have been some unevenly painted spots but it has become a family member, telling us of the people’s collective involvement with it. In such a scenario, would mechanical perfection or aesthetics of the wall matter? It is the same for cooking. Agreed, that I have to spend time to cook food, but the act of preparing, cooking and serving to family members becomes a part of our expression to connect with them at an emotional level that cannot be understood by intellectual analysis. Feelings of belonging and community are created in this way. Objects can be made value ridden, provided we spend time with them. Provided we make a conscious choice before any object is replaced. There might be hardship and involvement of time and our labour for doing things ourselves, but it can also give us the opportunity to form connections with other people. This brings me finally to another aspect of modern lifestyle.

The abundance of products in the market and the general trend of consumerization, further fuelled by robust economic conditions have led to fast turnover of objects of use and lessening of our involvement with them in the process of creation. It leads me to ponder what sort of connection one might develop with the object, if we hardly let it mingle with us for a sustained duration? Can these physically temporary objects (soon to be replaced by their new competitors) ever generate any emotional ties or memories with us? What would happen, if we sublet all our tasks to external agencies? Do we give ourselves a chance to make such objects a part of our lives or, have our perspectives towards looking at them been detached by the realization that they are soon to be replaced by newer variety? If everything around us is constantly getting replaced by something ‘different’ or ‘new’, where does that leave us? Or, in terms of the aspect of subletting, why should we ever bother to cook or build houses or mend lawns? How, then, would our memories be created by the fleeting interactions with these objects and by increased preferences to sublet things? Or would memories remain transient as the objects themselves, so that not even a single memory ever gets a chance to be embedded in our minds and create impressions of life? If memories remain transient, what does that make us as individuals? What sort of identity is created and what sort of life is experienced? This has repercussions on our lifestyles, on the way we look at ourselves and our people around us. Personal space and liberty is fine, but where does it lead us as a human community? If we don’t share moments of our time (and space) with other individuals, if all our objects are different (and transient as well) then one must ponder on the quality of life one is heading to. Abundance, luxury, flexibility and the affordability to be in constant change with regards to house, jobs (and even relations for that matter) can have a detrimental effect on the nature of relations we form amongst ourselves as communities. History and culture is a product of memory. Constant change would mean no memory and that would mean no history at all. Part of who we are or become depends on our association with memories – people, places and objects. Therefore, the experience of constant newness and constant change has to be viewed critically.

Sustained use has the power to form relations with objects just as precious as our relations with loving people around us. Doing things by oneself may mean being frugal again, but that is what leads to involvement. Thus the necessity of reuse or recycle or whatever term one wants to assign for sustainability has an advantage of memory creation. To be involved with such an approach would lead to memories that we would dwell on long after our ‘functional’ value diminishes. It is at that point of time, that the objects and the people around us would be our faithful friends telling us about the trials, mistakes and moments of joys that we had experienced resulting in the ripening of our lives. And it is therefore, in this context itself, those important objects, landscapes, architectural spaces need to be retained sometimes, for, they vibrate with stories of our connections with the past and can make our present meaningful. It is with this concept, the entire Indian landscape across the nation can be seen and experienced and which fundamentally differs from the industreial landscapes of the North Americas or Australia.

I hope, we understand, that ‘old’ doesn’t mean outdated or primitive in anyway. What is required is the right attitude towards seeing any object and the realization, that every object that we keep for ourselves, has the possibility to create value and be an extension of our ‘Self’. What we wish to possess starts to define who we are or become. If we continue to replace everything, there is no attachment with anything and there is no association of memory. Let not the abundance of objects and its faster replacement by ever changing technology create a situation that you are not able to express yourself in terms of the external environment. Or a situation, wherein no object or a person or any environment triggers your memory. Let not you experience the modern equivalent of ‘Alzheimer’.