Microblog Memes

The same thing happens to each of us individually. Consider what happens after you are gone.

First you are history. People who knew you intimately still walk the Earth. When they speak of you, they refer to events they recall specifically. They were an eye witness. They can recount a reasonable telling of your whole life story to a high degree of accuracy.

Next, you are legend. A few choice moments from your life are remembered. Did you die in some objectively comedic way? That may become a family legend of that one nephew that died doing that crazy thing. "Did you know you had an uncle that died while wingsuit diving?" Or some of your greatest life accomplishments are remembered. "Do you know your great Aunt once met and received an award from the President of the United States?" "Did you know your Great Grandfather helped invent (famous or world-changing device or technology.)" "Did you know that during the war, your Grandfather once killed a whole (large military number) of Nazi soldiers all by himself?" Your greatest deeds and misdeeds become the stuff of family and community legend. They are exaggerated, they are embellished. They are told by those who never knew you in life. But they refer to you as a real historical individual. You are a specific person that someone can point to on a family tree, a community historical archive, etc.

Finally, you are myth. Centuries have gone by. Individuals lose their distinction. Entire groups just blur together, compressed into stereotypes lasting centuries. Imagine how you personally perceive the people who lived in 13th century France. Unless you've studied a lot of Medieval history or literature, most people would struggle to name even a single real resident of 13th century France. Me? I have a vague sense of what the time was like. I'm imagining peasants, nobility, knights, religious crusades, etc. I'm imagining a pastiche made from cinema, old history videos and documentaries, some vague rememberings from a European History class I took in high school, and some Dan Brown podcasts. To me, the people who lived in that place and time may as well be myth. The individual persons are so lost to time, that any visage I construct in my mind will consist of entirely mythical people. I'm sure if I read some surviving diaries, some individuals from then would change from myth back to legend. But over time, records and sources are lost, or they are simply forgotten and read for the last time. In time all of us will slip into myth. We all become as real as Hector or Odysseus.