林小明去日本實驗室回來，行李箱李又是一大堆他自己根本不吃的各式糖果，全部都是機場買的、貴森森的那一種。可是其中一樣他每次會買也一定會吃：森永牛奶糖。

為什麼林小明對森永牛奶糖情有獨鍾呢？小時候是一級貧戶的林小明聽說窮到睡在豬圈正上方。(他的父母說的版本倒是非常不同！)他們羅東國小那一年的畢業旅行就是到台北參觀森永牛奶糖工廠。自稱對童年毫無記憶的林小明卻記得森永牛奶糖工廠內部細節以及出了工廠之後每個小朋友手上拿的一小包牛奶糖！

這樣一說，我卻記起我的義美椰子夾心酥來了：桶裝的夾心酥，整盒都是我的！(弟弟太小還不會吃餅乾) 我先吃旁邊那一片，先把所有夾心都用下門牙刮下吃掉，再拿另一片外皮用下門牙刮下吃掉，最後拿中間那一片精華，用下門牙刮下一面夾心吃掉，再用下門牙或上門牙刮下夾心吃掉，最後剩下那片餅乾......哇！心情好就分一片給阿祖，讓他讚美我是她「最乖的金柑仔孫」。剩下的一整鐵盒，藏起來！嘿嘿嘿嘿！

Ah! Memory!  James Joyce 一天的記憶就可以寫成 Ulysses 一本嚇死人的長篇小說，其中因為蛋糕啟動的記憶，最少出現十八次。普魯斯特更不得了。我應該來想想更多的「甜美」回憶！

"Help me Mnemosyne, thou Titaness
Thou ancient one, daughter of Heaven and Earth,
Mother of the Muses, who inhabit not
In flowery mount or crystal spring, but in
The dark and confin'd cavern of the skull -
O Memory, who holds the thread that links
My modern mind to those of ancient days"

- A.S. Byatt, Possession

Mnemosyne (1881), a Pre-Raphaelite interpretation of the goddess

by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mnemosyne

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Mnemosyne, Goddess of Memory

 Mother of The Muses

http://www.goddessgift.com/Goddess-myths/g-mnemosyne.htm

Mnemosyne, Greek goddess of memory, was considered one of the most powerful goddesses of her time. After all, it is memory, some believe, that is a gift that distinguishes us from the other creatures in the animal world. It is the gift that allows us to reason, to predict and anticipate outcomes, and is the very foundation for civilization.

Sadly, the goddess Mnemosyne is largely forgotten, lost in the mists of time.  When she is remembered it is usually only in the context of her being the mother of the Muses, though all acknowledge that without memory the lively arts of the Muses would never have been possible.

Mnemosyne was a Titaness, a daughter of the first generation of deities in Greece.  Her parents were the rulers Cronus and the goddess Gaia.

Mnemosyne is usually depicted with a full mane of luscious hair, often a rich auburn in color.  There are few stories about her even though she is often mentioned by the ancient poets who recount her awesome gifts to mankind.

The goddess Mnemosyne is sometimes credited with being the first philosopher, her gift the power of reason. She was given responsibility for the naming of all objects, and by doing so gave humans the means to dialog and to converse with each other.  The powers to place things in memory an that of remembrance were also attributed to this goddess.

Make no mistake about this. Memory was of the utmost importance at the time of Mnemosyne. Long before the invention of the alphabet and the written word, it was critical to the well-being of an individual or a society who had to rely solely on the lessons passed on in an oral history.

Besides, we're not talking about memorizing shopping lists or the times tables here. The memory of Mnemosyne was much more than that -- it was the memory of the rules and energies of the universe, the cycle of life, the memory of how to live in the world.

The ancients believed that when one died and crossed into the Underworld one would be given a choice . . . whether to drink from the river Lethe where you would forget all the pains and terrors of your previous life (and with them, the lessons they brought), or whether to drink from the Mnemosyne, the spring of memory.

Those who chose to forget had to be reborn, to return to earth to learn the lessons they needed.  Those who had chosen to remember were admitted to the Elysian Fields where they would spend eternity in comfort and peace.

The esteem in which the memory was held was made clear in  the initiation rites of the ancient gnostics, who were required to consult with an oracle.