After reading Chad's post on whether it's better to be loved and forgotten or hated and remembered, I thought about Teddy's first wife. Before T.R. was with his famous first lady he had married his college sweetheart, Alice Lee Hathaway.
If I had to pick an answer, it'd be loved and forgotten. Right now matters, because I can feel it. I won't really care after I'm dead (as far as I know). But I modified my response to a hybrid of the two; I'd want to be loved and remembered by those who matter.
Anyway, Roosevelt was completely infatuated with Hathaway throughout his college career at Harvard, and pursued her until she accepted. He called her is "darling little wife" and wanted to build her a mansion, show her off at society functions, etc.
In retrospect, he probably saw her more as a prize he won as opposed to a compatible spouse... but that's getting off topic.
SPOILER ALERT -- Alice died two days after giving birth to their only child. Not to mention, Teddy's mom died the same day, in the same house. T.R. was destroyed, but instead of mourning, he tried completely voiding her from his memory.
"Like a lion obsessively trying to drag a spear from its flank, Roosevelt set about dislodging Alice Lee from his soul. Nostalgia, a weakness to which he was abnormally vulnerable, could be indulged if it was pleasant, but if painful it must be suppressed, 'until the memory is too dead to throb.'" (232)
Details show it's clear he tried erasing any memory of her after she died. Photos were ripped up, letters destroyed. Roosevelt even avoided acknowledging she existed in his own autobiography. She was loved, but forgotten by the person that mattered to her.
That's what I wouldn't want.
And I might've started a book discussion. Oops.
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