Brain Fail

My brain is failing. I feel as though I have almost no capacity to retain information any more. Suzy will tell me to take out the trash or remind me the girls get out of school early or ask me to grab a can of diced tomatoes from the basement -- and I'll forget. I'll go into the kitchen and make myself a snack, never noticing the garbage can is overflowing and stinky. I'll come home from work, find the girls at home, and say, "What the heck are you doing here?" I'll go down the basement and stare at the shelves and think, say what now?

So yeah, you can make all the age jokes you want (I'm looking at you, Dan) but the fact is, my brain can only handle so much these days. It's full of student names, assignment revisions, committee work, abstract film theory, worries about my daughters, worries about the economy, sadness about my parents, anxiety about my dissertation, and tons and tons of useless entertainment industry information. (There's always room for that. Did you hear Demi Moore is being treated for "exhaustion?" I'm exhausted all the time, but, like most normal human beings, I don't have to go to the hospital for it.) With that soup swimming in my head, things like "What do I need to do during my office hour today?" elude me completely.

So I have a little notebook in my nightstand drawer, another in my school bag, and a stack of Post-its on my desk in my office, and I avail myself of them often. I make a to-do list once a day, usually at night, right before bed. In the morning, usually in the shower, I think of another half-dozen things I need to do and so add them to the list. (Perhaps this is TMI, but I always have my best ideas and remember things the most in the shower. Or on the lawnmower. Seriously. Those two activities enable my brain to relax and function better than almost any other thing.)

So then, armed with my list in my shirt pocket or the same pants pocket as my phone (so as to not forget about the list's existence), I head to work where I take it out and rest it right in front of my face near the keyboard of my computer. That way, I can't space out and let all those tasks drift off into the ether while I read Entertainment Weekly online. (Tracy Morgan fainted at the Sundance Film Festival this week. Once again, exhaustion. Exhaustion and high altitude. I guess anything is possible, right?) Obviously, I start with the thing that absolutely has to be done first due to a deadline, but, if there isn't something absolutely pressing, I pick a few things that I can get done right away - some quick emails that need to be sent, a phone call that needs to be made, paperwork I can just fill out and be done with, etc. That way, I get to scratch several things off the list immediately and I feel like I'm getting something done. I get great satisfaction from scratching items off the list.

Usually, by the end of my office hour or the end of the day, my list has an item or two left on it. I write them on a new Post-it and throw away the old one. I go home, put the new list on my nightstand, and wait for it all to start again.

I'm sure there was a time when I could remember things on my own without having to map out every little task - or maybe there wasn't. Maybe I was just younger and more irresponsible and, therefore, didn't care if I was forgetting stuff. Maybe what seems like sudden forgetfulness in your 30s is actually just a new sense of wanting to be a grown up and not neglect stuff any more. Then again, maybe my brain really is just turning to a nice rice pudding consistency. Not sure.