I hope the summer day finds itself a little foggy when you watch Beau Sia’s “Memory Sucks”. Maybe the air feels a little thicker with humidty than usual, sticking your shirt to your back, making you feel just uncomfortable enough to notice. I hope this video doesn’t hit you too hard, but I hope it hits you just hard enough — just hard enough to jolt that ball of black tar panic awake.

Eyad Zahra directed a beautiful video to accompany Sia’s slam-poetry, which socks you in the gut over and over. It reminds you of every moment you’ve called out of work sick when none of your symptoms were physical. It reminds you of the people you’ve left, or the ones who have left you,  when it felt like you had no other option. It reminds you how you tried so hard to find another option.

You can feel the pain in Beau’s voice. It simultaneously makes his voice falter while giving it incredible strength. His running list of places and things he never wants to visit again will hit a nerve, this I promise you. One of those locations, one of those named movies, one of those listed songs will remind you of someone you do not enjoy being reminded of. This particular person is maybe only rarely on your mind these days, but they’re still there, lurking in the outskirts. Swimming in your cerebrospinal fluid, patiently waiting, waiting, waiting to be lit up with an unexpected memory that hits you in places you thought you were safe, like on subway cars and in photo booths.

Like all of you, I’ve felt a jagged jig-saw at my heart, a melon baller to my brain, ice picks in my eyes. I’ve felt the important parts of me melt under the heat of an emotion I wasn’t prepared for. But I know I have never been hurt as badly as Beau Sia describes in this video.  It’s scary to think that someday I will be. It’s even more frightening to think that I never will.