My definition of memory:  It’s a part of our subconscience that computes life’s events, instilled to serve us for when we wish to recollect or locate something.

This is not to be confused with memories of the long ago past, as it seems my brain has no trouble remembering the color of a certain dress I may have worn when I was four years old, yet hesitates to remind me about what I ate for dinner last night.

I used to pride myself on my excellent memory. I am grateful that it still serves me up great detail of my past, but as my shorter term memory has somewhat vanished, making lists to do, to buy, to go, and reminders, have become part of my everyday living.

My great recollections of the yesteryears enable me to write a lot about my past. Thankfully, I don’t have to write about yesterday’s news or it may go something like this: “Um, right, yesterday as I was eating my ? for lunch, I realized I had forgotten where I put my keys after coming home from (insert wherever). I know I always leave them in the front hall desk drawer, and I remember getting sidetracked while placing them down. My cell phone rang in my purse before I barely got my boots off. . . ” That’s where the concentration ends.

When I’m no longer focused on the immediate task at hand and am taken off course by a distraction, I unconsciously disregard my original intent while focusing on the next event. This is how I tend to misplace things.

Retrieval Method: When I go into search mode, I pinpoint back to the last thing I remember doing at the time I placed down my keys and mull over what took place when I lost the item, which at least gives me a hint of the vicinity where I should begin looking.

Annoying little things like these types of incidents send my inner think tank into a frenzy. What really frustrates me about this little memory game are the moments when I lose a word. It often feels as though a name or a place sitting right there on the tip of my tongue is yet so far away from my brain to grasp. It isn’t that I don’t actually know the word to use, it just won’t reveal itself to me.

Words, keys, shoes, meals, occasionally get lost in a secret cabinet in my brain, which I occasionally lose access to. If I could only remember in what part of my brain I keep that little cabinet, I may be able to better remember where everything else is.

I know I must have plenty of company in this department?

D.G. Kaye ©2015