A THOUGHT FOR SORE MINDS

 ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED BY THE SOMERS RECORD (09-21-23)

 

     We're all getting older, even babies who were just born. But while they're getting smarter as they get older, I'm getting dumber. Maybe not dumber, because there is knowledge in my brain that is untapped, it's just getting harder and harder to get any of it out. My thoughts are not analogous to, say, untapped beer, which will benefit society once it starts to flow. Sometimes I will surprise people with the things that I know, because they can't believe anyone could remember that many lines from "F Troop," or advertising jingles from the 1970s. 

     My mother once lamented that she was losing her.... And the word that she couldn't remember, of course was "memory." She didn't suffer from dementia, or Alzheimer's or any brain deficiency, that's just the way she was. She was bright and clever, but sometimes couldn't make synapses perform the way she wanted to when she needed them. And that gene was passed down to me.

     I might be at a social function, and coming towards us is so-and-so, whose name we should remember but you only see them once a year, and I think it begins with a "D," but is it Deborah or Dominique? Or Deboranique? My wife and I have a system, where I preemptively strike and say with a laugh, "HEY, I know YOU! Ha, ha!" And before I have to prove it, my wife swoops in and says, "Hi," and sticks out her hand to shake so she can find out the name when the introductions are made. I'm dreading the day when Darlene (or whatever the hell her name is) turns to my wife and says, "AND, I know YOU!" Which means she doesn't remember our names either, possibly even her own.

     "What the hell is her name?" I'm struggling. "Go through the alphabet," my wife suggests. "Okay, I think it's a state, like Dakota, or Denver, or Dallas, or something." "None of those are states," she points out, but I'm still singing the alphabet and now I have to start over. "I know it's not Rhode Island. Wait, I think it's a flower, like Dahlia, or Daisy, or Delphinium." "She does grow on you," my wife offers. "Hold on, I think it's a feeling, like Desiree or Destiny or Divinity. Wait- I think it's a crustacean, like Daphnia." Once the woman finally tells me her name I say, "No, that's not it."

     So I signed up on a web site that sends a daily program of brain games, to tighten up my mental acuity and memorization skills. I couldn't remember my password, so it wasn't off to a flying start. In one of the games you pretend you're a waiter, and different people walk into the restaurant and you have to remember their names. Strangely enough, I rose to the top level of competition, and remembered everyone's name, but I found that it only worked with drawings of people, and not real people. It seems that I'm good at things that make you appear smart if you don't look too closely. I display a certain amount of perspicacity in knowing words like "perspicacity," but when I go to use them, people just assume I made them up and I look dumber than usual.

     I guess there's a lot we don't know about the brain. Years ago I signed up for the organ registry, which I'm glad I didn't have to do in person. "I'd like to donate my brain to Science." And the clerk would say, "WHICH science would that be, geology?" and I'd say, "Let's make it Popular Science?" "Okay, just have a seat and I'll send somebody over for it." "Well, I meant AFTER I'm dead." She says, "Don't worry, that's an electric chair. Just kidding." By the way, what happens if I donate a kidney, and then MY remaining kidney fails? Do I need to knock on somebody's door and try to get my old one back? I don't want a stranger's kidney because what if my body rejects it? I don't take rejection well.

     Thoughts are in there, I just know they are. Sometimes I can't get to sleep at night because my mind is racing. When I finally wake up it's clear that it has lost. I'm not a morning person, so I have to wait until at least 10:00 before making any decisions. Breakfast is at 10:01. At work I avoid clichés when I'm running a meeting. If I say, "And that's it in a nutshell," I run the risk of people thinking to themselves that it should have stayed in the nutshell.