History Can Only Be Written From the Now Perspective

Earlier in this blog I spoke about the fact that we can and do rewrite our lives. The past is ever changing. For instance, if you wrote about your wonderful, perfect, enchanting marriage on your second anniversary, and then wrote about the very same marriage after an acrimonious divorce five years later, the facts might be the same, "We were married for seven years." But, the tone would certainly be different. The memories would be different. You would remember the things you ignored when everything was rosy. You might even say that it was a terrible marriage. You might include the first two years in that evaluation.

I think all history, all facts, are completely changing all the time because of our present values, state of mind, judgements and so on. When I was a kid, my brave parents took us kids on a history tour in Pennsylvania, Maryland, D.C. and New York. It must have been an adjunct to visiting my paternal grandmother in Kutztown, PA. We went to Gettysburg, Annapolis, and some place where Teddy Roosevelt had lived and had mounted many stuffed heads of animals he had shot on his African safaris.

OK, that's a fact. As a kid I was shocked, but awed. The tour guide thought it was great. (He was paid to.) It showed a brave, adventurist President who would put himself in danger and conquer the wilds. Today, my view, garnered from my current perspective and more recent historical writings, is that he was a pretty cowardly spoiled brat who exalted in showing off.

Them's fighting words. So, it turns out that his safaris included up to 3,000 support people, (read 'servants') who carried everything for his comfort including him and his bath tub. It includes people who actually shot the animals he supposedly shot. The fighting words carry on to include the fact that he liked killing buffalo and Indians and Mexicans and Cubans as much as he liked killing elephants and tigers. If I were to write that history now, I would probably mention these things that bother me from my current perspective. If I had lived soon after him when the sins of American conquest might not have looked so blatant, I might have written a different history.

My dear friend, Lama Marut, suggests that if your are somehow compelled to write history from your current perspective, (the only one you have) you might as well be happy about your past. Like, "That shitty marriage taught me to be much more independent." instead of, "He ruined my life." He is not suggesting that we be ignorant or Pollyannaish. He is suggesting that we see things as they were and then appreciate that our past experiences made us who we are now and that any other attitude than gratitude will keep us unhappy.

I return to this point again and again because it is a tough one to put into practice. If we relive the past through memories or history books, the most hopeful thing we can hope to accomplish is to learn not to repeat our mistakes. If we learn from our past and improve ourselves and our actions then we can be thankful for everything that happened. God Bless Teddy Roosevelt. I'll never have my 'bearer' shoot another elephant for me. 

P.S. I really enjoyed the book about his South American trip, River of Doubt.