Memory Loss

My brain is in a state of flux. I hadn't really noticed until one day a friend asked me to participate in a game of finding mistakes. It was indeed a simple task of focusing and selecting, but somehow it took me a great deal of mental strength. I felt as if I was pulling tons of weight using a severely stiffed muscle.

Sure the signs have always been there. I've always have trouble remembering people's name and their birthdays. A person can be around me every Sunday for a year and would have slipped my attention. As of today, I'm still drawing blanks upon remembering my best friend of 13 years date of birth.

I don't really know how I got here. Perhaps it's the age. Scientist says that your brain begins to slow down when you get to your mid twenties (voila!) and continues to lose its capacity at the same rate every year until the time when you enter the zone of mental incapacity, dementia and paranoia.

Living in Jakarta has certainly put me in a shell. There hasn't been a need to update myself. I haven't been to any lectures, watch a single news or read a single book. I forgot about the days of stimulative conversations with fellow thinkers or interesting propositions made by front line idea generators. The only concern these days seem to circle around being domesticated. The dogma was so overpowering that one (and one's family) will be engulfed and engrossed in the search of finding a husband. It is a tide that one can't really escape from.

Perhaps it's the sheer laziness I've let and grown accustomed to. With the advanced technology and my blackberry always within an arm's reach, I don't really find a need to remember things. Google Calendar has set it all for me. At this time, I've to meet person A in location A and I wasn't going to forget that because Google Calendar has sent me a reminder. Facebook reminds me of the people I used to go to school or work with, an acquaintance of an acquaintance, their liking, family and of course, their birthdays. Twitter summarizes my daily news and keeps me updated with the emotional state of many strangers I've never met. And all of that is easily accessible within my most prized possession, blackberry.

Or perhaps it's the self defense mechanism I've taught myself well; of remembering and forgetting. In the case of goodbyes, I have deliberately choose to remember the clear skies, the walk, the laughter we had rather than the constant fights, moments of tears and the minute a wave means an end. Certainly, situations have cornered me to carefully select which memories to keep and lose. Subconsciously however, I have mastered the art of completely forgetting things.

Whatever it is, maybe it's about the time I should pick up my Oscar Wilde book that I never seem to finish.