Have you ever run a disk defrag on your hard disk? When you did, did you watch what it showed you?Once, I defragmented my hard disk, and watched, mesmerized. The defrag utility takes bits of files that have gotten spread out all over the disk and puts them together. It clears away parts of deleted files that have been left there. It opens the space for new files, new information.
A few nights ago, while I was lying in my bed, my overtired brain started coughing up partial images, bad thoughts, bad memories, and random pieces of television shows that I've watched. I started to ponder - what would it be like if I could defrag my brain?
Could I delete the crystal clear image of a mother beating her child in Ganei Hataarucha in Tel Aviv some 20 years ago? Could I replace it with the periodic table of elements? That would come in handier than that image that haunts me sometimes.
How about the memory of being trapped in a foot locker? Could I replace that with something more pleasant? Say the memory of picking blueberries with my sister?
And how about this tiny segment of a memory that I have of being in a giant tent? I can't figure out if it's from a trip I took when I was 14 or one I took while I was in college. All I have is a few faint images.
And what about people who went through serious trauma, like the holocaust? Why can't G-d just pre-load a defrag utility onto us?
