Bruce
Wainwright
Olden wonder
“I think, therefore, I am’ said Descartes. Perhaps it
would have been more accurate to say: “I am what I remember.”
Memory is everything, and without it we are hardly better than vegetables.
It comes as no surprise to learn that memory, and particularly short term
memory, tends to get a bit feeble as you grow older. Your car-keys and glasses
go missing with a disturbing regularity, even though you had them only a minute
ago. Halfway up the stairs you’ve completely forgotten what it was you
were going up for anyway, until you feel the warm pee trickle down your leg
and you remember.
On the other hand, long-term memories have an uncanny way of returning. People
I haven’t given a thought to for 30 or 40 years are now back again as
clear as if I’d seen them yesterday, and I can’t help wondering
if this kind of selective memory isn’t significant in some way. Why
should I suddenly begin to think about a fresh-faced youth who used to give
me a lift to the swimming baths on the back of his motorbike? No idea. Though,
as someone who has no interest in reliving the past, does not have a subscription
to Friends Reunited and has never been to any kind of reunion, the sudden
appearance of figures from the past, in glorious Technicolor detail is slightly
unsettling. 
Of course, the memory loss to worry about is when you can’t quite recall
which goes on first: the trousers or the underpants. Then you do need to be
worried. The fear of dementia and all its attendant indignities is one of
the reasons why older men, who you would suppose would know better, still
manage to catch HIV. A vibrant, unrestrained sex life, sans condoms, followed
by a relatively early death from HIV/Aids, is unfortunately seen by some as
an acceptable alternative to slow decay and dissolution. That Aids is often
accompanied by dementia and number of other equally unpleasant conditions
is, needless to say, conveniently forgotten.
We all know well enough that there’s no fool like an old fool, andsome
of us are not so good at assessing risk. Age is supposed to impart a well
polished patina of good, sound common sense, not unlike the shine on an old
bit of furniture. Bollocks. What age all too often imparts is a sense of urgent
desperation which says: get it while you can. Don’t ask too many questions
and don’t make too much of a fuss if he doesn’t like to use a
condom. It’s a response born of low self-esteem and desperation, and
it is one that is to be found among the young as well as the old, but either
way, the consequences can be dire.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the box of pills lies on the table, carefully
allocated to each day of the week. The buzzing watch is set for the next dose,
and you would have thought that years of practice would have rendered the
process strictly a no-brainer. Not so. The watch goes off at the right time
and I turn to the box of pills and the first thing I see are this morning’s
pills sitting there still waiting to be taken. I’ve missed a dose -
again. Now that is why short-term memory is really rather important and why
losing it isn’t to be encouraged. So away with the hash brownies and
in with the ginkgo biloba.
