When Joan Didion speaks of the golden land, she speaks of California.

But this touches on something universal.

For this passage echos of nearly every city I have ever been to.

I mean, the loss of memory she points to was the theme of this entire article on the Hajez.

How often, and how quickly, the next generation is ready to cast aside the past.

My advice is to remember the old ways.

I think remembering is one of the virtues of a life well-lived.

The future always looks good in the golden land, because no one remembers the past. Here is where the hot wind blows and the old ways do not seem relevant, where the divorce rate is double the national average and where one person in every thirty-eight lives in a trailer.

-Joan Didion, Slouching Towards Bethlehem