Am I the only one who is this forgetful?

By PETER GAITHO
Published February 21, 2010

“I think I have lost my mind! All the $200 I went to withdraw is missing from my wallet,” read an SMS from Jack Kimana, my friend from Limuru, now domiciled in Pembroke, Mass. I tried to figure out how he lost the amount, especially because, there are no casinos in Massachusetts. That money was supposed to be his chama contribution.

When we met, I did not know whether to laugh, or cry with Jack. “I remember going through the motions of withdrawing money from the ATM machine. Believe you me, I think I trashed my $200, and pocketed the transaction receipt.”  I was trying my best to hide the mirth building up in my system.

“I later went back to the convenience store, and ransacked the trash bin to no avail,” he said. “ I need to see a doctor, this is not normal.” The way he said it made us fall over ourselves with laughter.

“My friend, welcome to the forgetting club. If you think you are alone, you have just joined a long list of us,” I tried to be as analytical as possible. “Do you know that the other day I peeled a banana, trashed it, and stated munching the peel. I was too embarrassed to share this story with anyone else before today.”

“You are not serious,” Jack said amid pearls of laughter.

These episodes reminded me of the many instances when my memory failed me. The other day I prepared a cup of tea, got up, opened the kitchen drawer to get the sugar bowl, then my mind went blank. I totally forgot why I stood up, why I opened the drawer, and what I needed in that drawer. Damn it! I went back to sit, before it hit me that all I needed was sugar.

I remember talking with my friend, Oliver Kyambi, over the phone, before Samson Mwaniki joined us in the conversation. Suddenly, I started looking for my phone, and informed my friends about it. “Which phone are you looking for?” Oliver asked. “I was holding my phone a few moments ago, but now I cannot see it,” I said with frustration written all over my face.

“Then which phone are you using now?” Samson interjected. “OMG, I have lost it. I am bonkers. Somebody pray for me,” I replied. You should have seen my embarrassment. By this time, my two friends were LTAO; if you do not know these acronyms, you belong to the museum.

Three ladies were sharing their memory lapse episodes. The first one said; “I am so forgetful nowadays, when I wake up and sit on my bed, before I put on my sandals, I cannot remember whether I was getting up, or going to sleep.”

The second one said; “When I rest at the landing as I go upstairs, I seem to forget whether I was going up or down.”

“I do not have any memory loss,” said the third lady, banging her knuckles on the table. She then stood up to open the door. Apparently, when she knuckled the table, she thought someone had knocked on the door.

I think I know what we are all suffering from: information overload. We have so many things to do  that we have filled up the space in our hard disks. It’s like my computer, which keeps reminding me that I have low disk space.

During times like these, I usually long for the days of my great grandfather, Muthongo wa Kaniu. All the man had to remember, was that he was married to eight wives, and did not care to recall the names of the numerous children born in his boma. Can you believe the series of numbers I have to remember? They include, social security, phones, debit cards pin numbers, numerous online passwords and usernames, my wife and kids’ birthdays and anniversaries, vehicle registration, speed limit, zip code, and so on and so on.

One day I parked my car in the multi-storied parking garage of Logan Airport, Boston. When I came back, I completely lost my directions. I did not help matters in any way, when I called airport security. All I could do was describe the make of the car and color. I could not remember my car’s registration number even after owning it for four years. Mother of God!

As we sweat and rush, curse and work, we only have 24 hours to do so much. We have become creatures of multi- tasking, hence overloading the brain. Driving while dressing, shaving or brushing teeth is no longer a preserve of Mr. Bean; we are now doing the three while on the phone. Others dare send text messages as they drive, and the dare devils chat with their Facebook friends as they cruise at 75 mph. Then we later wonder why we have a blank blue screen on our mental computer.

It was john Irvin who said, “Your memory is a monster, you forget – it doesn’t. It simply files things away. It keeps things for you, or hides things from you – and summons them to your recall with a will of its own. You think you have a memory, but it has you!”

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