The Cemetery of Untold Stories

“Dementia” is the umbrella term for a group of diseases that cause memory loss and cognitive impairment, especially in older people. Alzheimer’s is just one form of dementia. The pattern of forgetting can be different from one type of dementia to another. In some cases, a person forgets their past and identity, while others show evidence of short-term memory loss but retain clear recollections of the past. Various forms of forgetting form a motif in this story. Both of Alma’s parents develop dementia, but Manuel’s dementia is, in a literary sense, more of an inability to forget, for he becomes caught up in an endless cycle of regret for a past that he cannot change or escape. Similarly, Tatica’s dementia causes her to forget that she is a patient and not a worker, and the woman reminds Alma of her father’s final years, forcing her to wonder if and when the disorder will come to her and her sisters. For Alma, her untold stories are the memory loops in which she will eventually become stuck.

Forgetting also appears in the story in a nonclinical way, often in the form of willful forgetting or collective memory loss. For example, Perla attempts to forget what Filomena told her about Tesoro’s act of sexual assault. This feat takes effort, as “[e]very time the specter of her sister comes up, Perla throws another fistful of forgetfulness on the memory” (84). However, Alavarez also suggests that such forms of forgetting are harmful and ineffectual, for the story is lodged inside of Perla and surfaces in a deadly way when she is forced to confront living evidence of Tesoro’s betrayal. Perhaps most notably, Bienvenida is on the receiving end of collective forgetting, for Trujillo’s new wife removes Bienvenida’s name from all public places, effectively erasing her from history. Bienvenida would prefer to remain lost to memory, but the publication of her story keeps her from fading away forever.