Memory, by Nina Miller

All of my contemporaries are worried about their memory.

It begins with the elusive noun — what is that guy's name? We had this wonderful dinner at ______?  It moves on to dates — when was it we went to Russia? to Yosemite?

We all complain of household lapses. I walked down the hall to get something but I couldn't remember why I was there. And we sometimes let things we should do slip by: appointments we should keep, performances for which we have tickets. We tease each other as a way of minimizing the anxiety, but it hovers over our shoulders, threatening what is supposed to be the serenity of the later years.

Some of us take preventive steps, like courses in memory retention. I do jigsaw and crossword puzzles and play Scrabble, having read that the brain-hand connection is useful. Recently a group of students came to the house to include me in a study of seniors living with chronic pain. The study seemed flawed to me in its design, but there was one element that I loved, which involved some mathematical memory activity forward and backward. I knocked it out of the park, and for weeks I comforted myself with that success as I searched for lost glasses, keys, a dental bridge.

I like to think that the decline in memory is not due to cells that are dying, or knots deep in the interior of my brain, but rather on an overload of information. The reason I can't remember the last novel I read is because I've read so many novels. My friend's name, a friend I've known for years? Well, I have so many friends; how could I possibly remember all their names? The video I just put on seems vaguely familiar. Ten minutes in and I realize I've already seen it. But then, I've seen thousands of movies.

Nice rationalizations, but really of no comfort. Mnemonic devices, notes to myself, younger friends who tactfully whisper missing information into my ear — those things help. As does letting go of the struggle to retrieve a name or event from the foggy forest of my mind. Somehow, when I'm not struggling, the missing piece of data pops into consciousness, and I want to kiss it, out of gratitude. It may happen moments after I've given up the struggle to extract it, or even  weeks later.

I would like to know more about the physiology of the aging brain. Did my smoking (given up almost 50 years ago) leave blank holes? And what is the impact of my daily Scotch? Wait, no, I don't want to know about that one because it's a behavior I'm unwilling to change.

I've watched several friends travel the terrifying road of Alzheimer's. That, or dementia, is the fear that lies beneath our anxiety over lost names and missing keys. Mostly these friends have descended quietly into that dark and lonely place, though a few gentle, sweet people have become aggressive and even violent. It is the survivors who suffer most, I think, as they watch someone beloved, someone who was an anchor of strength, fade away. 

I cannot, will not, do that to my children. I don't want to leave them with a memory of me lost to them, lost to myself. And so I formulate a plan to obtain what is needed and try to work out the legalities, the  alternatives. Most of all, I hope I can remember the plan in all of its details when the time comes.