Remembering what one reads

Nice thing about dementia is that you are always making new friends. You can hide your own Easter eggs. Buy your own presents and be surprised on Christmas morning.

I’m not sure where the sentiments above came from but they are accurate. I guess. While my memory is probably not what it once was (which was never great), I still remember things like doctor appointments, shopping lists, car keys, etc. I will admit that I have long used strategies of keeping lists on my phone, my calendar updated, and items, like keys, always in one place. Our technology has delayed, if not the loss, at least the impact of the loss, of human memory.

In conversation with a friend one evening, I bemoaned the fact that I often forget almost everything about a book soon after reading it. I could read the same mystery every year and still be surprised at the twisted conclusion. I find myself often going to Goodreads to help me remember the plot and setting of a book - and especially my reaction to it in the review.

But what Laura, a high school English teacher, said after my complaint was “Sometimes you should just enjoy the experience of the book while reading it.”

And on reflection, that is what I usually do, especially my “junk food” reading of mysteries and science fiction and the latest silly bestseller. Most of my movie watching is not to learn or be emotionally or intellectually deepened, but to simply pass the time in an interesting way. Some authors write such good “junk reading” that I re-read them over and over - Connelly, Child, and McDonald, especially.

I will remember Laura’s comment the next time I berate myself for not concentrating more on my books. I will just enjoy them. 

Or at least I will try to remember.

Comments

[JimJim]

Nick Hornby has a few collections of book reviews. They are hilarious and at one point he talks about this. How he forgets most of what he’s read and wonders what the point of reading even is. But he still does it and loves it and writes about it pretty well, so there’s that. You still seem pretty sharp to me. Cheers.

[Doug Johnson]

Thanks, Mr Randolph,

It's my kids I hope to keep trying to convince I still have most of my marbles so they don't take my car keys away!
Hope you had a nice Thanksgiving!

Doug