Do you do this? Naw, I am probably the only one who wool-gathers almost constantly.
I put a banana in the sink. The skin, I mean, after I was done eating the fruit.
I knew it was time to discard it, and the garbage can is under the sink. So I was in the right region of the kitchen, but I lost my way by thinking of something or other as I turned around. The aforementioned Lost Way just involved me turning around in our narrow kitchen, but my mind went elsewhere in that brief instant of time.
Shortly afterward, I also turned when I didn't need to and opened the fridge in my search for cooking oil which is actually kept in a little cupboard over the stove on the other side. Once again, I remembered item + door, but with my mind having shifted to an unelated something or other, I just opened a random door.
I have done a similar thing enough times while grocery shopping. I reach for an item on the shelf, but somehow I get distracted and grab the item next to it. The wrong item, as it turns out.
Absent-mindedness has always been an issue with me, like the time I kept opening and shutting the same car door. It was after school one day when Sue heard me banging the car door again and again in the driveway.
I had got out of the front seat and made to retrieve my briefcase from the backseat. I opened the door and thought something like, "Oh, I guess I am supposed to lock the back door." I pushed the button down (remember those days?) and shut the door. Then, I would remember the briefcase and rinse and repeat.
Now I am not saying that I repeated this a million times, but I think it took me three tries to actually retrieve the briefcase. I was pretty young then too, so this is not a senility issue, or not just and solely a senility issue.
I know that I blogged about the briefcase incident once before, probably in more detail, but I couldn't find that post today.
At least I think I know that I wrote about it. My problem isn't so much memory but just letting my mind wander off absently and aimlessly in multiple directions.
Keeping my mind on one thing at a time is a major problem these days for me. It is so easy to get distracted. I use timers a lot to remember things. I haven’t forgotten why I set the timers…yet!
ReplyDeleteYou need to FOCUS, dear!
ReplyDeleteMy dear old Dad used to get so angry with himself when he muddled things up. I used to remind him that that organic computer he called his brain had downloaded a LOT of information in 95 years. And we all know how the wires can get crossed when the hard drive is FULL.
ReplyDelete... well as you or Sue aren't concerned, I can assume there are lots of funny tales to come out of this trait.
ReplyDeleteHah! It amuses and worries me to hear the idea that it “happens as we age”...... for I have been doing this sort of thing my whole life. If it gets worse for me, I do not think there is any hope! :)
ReplyDeleteHah..... by the way, I STILL drive my beast that has manual locks..... and windows..... and a manual tranny too. It is only 14 years old.
PipeTobacco
Well, you probably do have more important things on your mind...which other people just have to accept as your genius at work!
ReplyDeleteI can empathize....I once couldn't find my phone after putting groceries away, got a neighbor to call me, and heard my phone ringing dimly, in the kitchen. It was in the freezer.
ReplyDeleteIt happens. I have good days and bad days when I can't remember things. I try not to let it bother me too much. :-)
ReplyDeleteYou are not alone.
ReplyDeleteI can sympathize with your missteps in the kitchen, having put the crackers in the fridge more than once.
ReplyDeleteOn the flip side of this issue it is concentrating! I've been there.
ReplyDeleteI can't tell you how often I've needed to turn one direction to do a task, but turned the other and went around in a full circle.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure I'm absent-minded at times too.
ReplyDeleteNot an issue for me.
ReplyDeletePerhaps not a memory issue as much as focus. I can get very abstract random sometimes which causes me to misplace things or not remember whether I automatically did what I was supposed to, like shut the garage door.
ReplyDeleteI think everybody has those things happening to them. Well, at least I do!
ReplyDelete