Archive of the Covenant

Back when I was around 5, I started this project. The goal apparently was to document everything. This first took the form of tape recording, then writing, then video documentation. Each of these elements took turns, depending upon exactly what technology was available at any given moment.

I wasn't certain exactly what the purpose was until my mid-twenties. It seemed that there was simply an inside voice, a "muse" if you will, that said things like: "Turn on the tape recorder now and begin speaking". Or: "Just make things". It never occurred to me to question the voice, or to even consider the possibility that there was something very strange about it all. I really was in no position to ask such questions until I became an unofficial "adult", perhaps in my early thirties. By then, any inspiration had the horribly boring question to accompany it: "But what am I going to do with this when it's finished? Is it "marketable"? Will it further my "agenda" in some way? Is there an "audience" for it?"

I knew better than to ask such predictable, meaningless questions, but found it hard to resist the indoctrination that I had been inundated with for so many years. So there was a kind of dichotomy, constantly challenging myself with questions that, logically, were completely valid... but I knew deep inside that these questions had no real foundation and that they were an utter waste of time.

The pattern that seems to have emerged is that I simply forget about my legacy every so often, and am then reminded due to some seemingly insignificant revelation or a mundane task. One example: From 1995 or so until 2000, I worked diligently on a novel called "Consider Where This Joke Can Lead". I wrote often and it was, among other things, a primary artistic focus in my life. Yet, when I came across the old WordPerfect file while scanning an old hard drive a few weeks ago, it occurred to me that I had not even thought about it... not once... in almost three years.

This is why I embarked upon the recent archiving project. With my first slate of "free time" available since early last Fall, it seemed like the obvious thing to do.

And since then I've uncovered a veritable glut of forgotten items, all saved with a certain reverence, but uncatalogued and effectively buried. It's something like a hard drive filled with digital photographs, and the folder and files are all labeled "IMG3726485" and such, so that you know you have plenty of something there but no idea exactly what.

It's all been exponential. When I decided to consolidate all my old hard drives, I decided that I should also begin to make digital archival copies of all my old cassette tapes, all recordings of self and friends and relatives and many events I have taken part in since the age of 5. There are a good 350 of these tapes now, and countless hours on minidisc and on various old hard drives.

Then of course I remembered the old video tapes, which go back to 1987 and span 3 different formats. It is obvious that some kind of compilation is in order here. And when I started scanning notebooks, looking for a list I made some years back of videotaped contents, I was confronted with shelves of notebooks, all equally crammed with memories, equally disorganized, equally forgotten.

Archiving has always been the only activity requiring so much organization and tedium that I've enjoyed, and it has always baffled me. It seems clear to me lately, though, that it's a brutal and tender reminder of the legacy, something we all have and hold close. To combine all the old recording and writings with the scrapbook of the mind and heart is a very special kind of reunion.