Friday, May 21, 2004
The Resistence of Memory
My mind works in very, very strange ways. I’m not suggesting that I’m in Rain Man territory here; I don’t have the rugged good looks and I’m not nearly sharp enough at math. No, my problem is that my brain seems to function solely as a repository for old sitcom plots and Avril Lavigne songs, leaving important information to languish like the studio audience at a Suddenly Susan taping.
For instance, the other day at the video store I found myself utterly stumped when asked merely to contribute my home phone number. If they’d asked me for the name of the kid who threw up on my Mother’s Day card in second grade, however, I would have been all set. I am eternally 100% unable to recollect my account number at the bank, but as to the 37 different showtimes for 13 Going on 30 at the River East theater I have total recall. And during the bar exam, I found myself struggling to concentrate on important concepts like commercial paper and judicial abstention, but completely focused as to the weird break-time behaviors of the mullet-headed, romance-novel-toting exam taker three rows down from me. It’s like my body’s sitting there trying to live like an adult in the real world, but my brain is in the next room watching General Hospital.
So what do I plan to do about this? Nothing, really. I mean, if the government wants to commission a study on this rare mental condition, I’ll gladly take their money and spend it on CDs and candy, but otherwise I’ll just be sitting around at home remembering the dialogue from old Budweiser commercials verbatim. Assuming, that is, that I can figure out my address.
My mind works in very, very strange ways. I’m not suggesting that I’m in Rain Man territory here; I don’t have the rugged good looks and I’m not nearly sharp enough at math. No, my problem is that my brain seems to function solely as a repository for old sitcom plots and Avril Lavigne songs, leaving important information to languish like the studio audience at a Suddenly Susan taping.
For instance, the other day at the video store I found myself utterly stumped when asked merely to contribute my home phone number. If they’d asked me for the name of the kid who threw up on my Mother’s Day card in second grade, however, I would have been all set. I am eternally 100% unable to recollect my account number at the bank, but as to the 37 different showtimes for 13 Going on 30 at the River East theater I have total recall. And during the bar exam, I found myself struggling to concentrate on important concepts like commercial paper and judicial abstention, but completely focused as to the weird break-time behaviors of the mullet-headed, romance-novel-toting exam taker three rows down from me. It’s like my body’s sitting there trying to live like an adult in the real world, but my brain is in the next room watching General Hospital.
So what do I plan to do about this? Nothing, really. I mean, if the government wants to commission a study on this rare mental condition, I’ll gladly take their money and spend it on CDs and candy, but otherwise I’ll just be sitting around at home remembering the dialogue from old Budweiser commercials verbatim. Assuming, that is, that I can figure out my address.
