This brings me to yet another bit of brilliance from the electronic world. Recently, SeniorWomenWeb’s editor posted a press release from University of Chicago that was designed to enlighten seniors who fret over memory problems, explaining that it's not that we're becoming forgetful, but that our brains are simply too full of hard-earned knowledge.
A website called The Telegraph (a "Media Group" from the United Kingdom), dated February 24, agrees with that. The headline reads:
"Brains of elderly slow because they know so much."
Like old computers that have hard drives that are handling lots and lots of data, we, too, take longer and longer to access bits of information. In other words, the brains of older people do not weaken: they’re just on an overload.
Okay, so we simply know too much. Thanks a lot for the feel-good moment, but now what? Any suggestions about how we can reboot, or delete all the random bits? Or buy a new brain?
It doesn’t seem fair, but we have virtually no control over what chooses to stick to the brain like a burr to a wooly sock. Back in 1952, when I was 16 and taking Latin III, I had to memorize the opening passage of Virgil's Aeneid. I did my little classroom recitation, and never bothered with it again, and yet today, if prompted, I can easily break into my chant: "Arma virumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris, Italiam, fato profugus, Lavinaque venit litorae multum ille et terris iactatus et alto …" etc. Needless to say, there have been very few occasions when I felt called upon to hold forth in public. In fact, there have been none. Zero.
I have been glad that I learned Latin, if only for the fact that it went a long way to explaining English grammar, something never really taught in my earlier school years. It also helped my English vocabulary by way of recognizing word roots, but believe me, I would love to free up the neurons which are knotted around dear old Mr. Virgil, so that I could use them for other pursuits.
All of which isn’t a matter of choice, alas. Nowadays, when I have to learn something new, it seems to take forever, and when I take notes, I lose them almost as quickly as I have written them down … which drawer did I put that in? Which drawer in which desk/table/bureau? In which room? What color was the paper I wrote them down on (this is more likely to stick in my brain, and helps if there’s a pile of other bits of paper wherever it was that I put it …)
My memory used to be easily accessible, and practically fail-proof. Nowadays, when I walk across the room to retrieve something from a cabinet, I find myself opening the one to the right or left of the one I wanted, and wondering why whatever it was that I came for, isn’t there. No amount of vitamin B, or mnemonic devices, or prior self-warnings ("now DO NOT FORGET this") seem to help.
I am afraid that all the kind words about "overload" and "too much accumulated knowledge" don't help a lot. Truth is, like our ossifying joints and dimming eyes and thinning hair, our brains are just getting ... old. At this point, I’ve learned to settle for slower and creakier in any body part, as long as it (or its replacement) still works. I just hadn’t considered my brain as a body part, subject to wear and tear and overload.
Common wisdom tells us that a body can be improved by exercise and a few lively interests in something outside the self, so we continue to go to the gym, and read books, and do good works. But it seems to me that right along with exercise and outside interests, learning to laugh at oneself is excellent medicine. In fact, our unique ability to laugh may be one of the brain’s best functions. It surely beats having a good cry.
©2014 Julia Sneden for SeniorWomen.com
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