Whew! What a relief to learn that when you walk into a room with some purpose in mind, only to completely forget what that purpose was is not because of old age?
What? Yes, it turns out that doors themselves are to blame for these strange memory lapses. Now listen up… no now read up…
Psychologists at the University of Notre Dame have discovered that passing through a doorway triggers what's known as an event boundary in the mind, separating one set of thoughts and memories from the next. Your brain files away the thoughts you had in the previous room and prepares a blank slate for the new locale.
It's not old me, it's the door!
Psychologists at the University of Notre Dame have discovered that passing through a doorway triggers what's known as an event boundary in the mind, separating one set of thoughts and memories from the next. Your brain files away the thoughts you had in the previous room and prepares a blank slate for the new locale.
It's not old me, it's the door!
Thank goodness for a study like this one and there should be more because we might learn that all of our experiences growing old are not caused by old age but are caused by some rational psychological phenomenon that affects young people too. Wanna bet…
Okay, if you buy that one I have some acreage that I would like you to buy from me. I’ll show it to you during low tides.
But, there is some truth to all of this in that we tend to blame all of our problems on old age and forget that sometimes there might be another cause. You know a cause that we can do something about. We can’t turn back the clock and make us a robust young 75 again. No, we are stuck with our age but remember what I have noted before several times that there are young 80 year olds and there are old 80 year olds. Okay, maybe not young 80 year olds but less-old 80 year olds. And, less not forget there are lots of dead 80 year olds.
The other day I was in a car dealership talking to a young lady car salesperson. Yes, a young woman trying to sell me a new car. Well, I started with a slick salesman who got my brain thinking buy, buy, yes buy. Of course when I went into that car dealership I was not going to buy a new car – certainly not now, but later. Oh yes, read on…
After he left she continued the spiel but somehow learned that I was 81 years old. I guess I told her that when she wanted me to take out a 6-year note on a lone to buy the car – you know only $200 a month. Now are you ready for this?
She said, ‘I can’t believe that you are 81 years old.’
I frowned and said, ‘I look older?’ Of course knowing that she really meant younger – at least I hoped so.
I continued, ‘Well, how old do you think I am?’ I love that comeback because young people do not know what to say. Now they begin rapidly thinking what age to make me and even making me 11 years young like 70 sounds old to a young person so they kind of stutter and mention something like 60. Of course, now you know they are lying but it still feels good. And, yes when you are trying to sell a new car to an old person it is good to make them feel younger.
I bought the car!
Now don’t think I bought a new car because a pretty young salesperson was helping (?) me. No, I bought the car because I felt like I had to buy a new car. But, why did I want to buy a new car? The one I had was perfectly good with only 89,000 miles on it. It was a Honda Fit getting good gas mileage – 42 mpg. And, Consumer Reports noted a few issues back that this car is good for 200.000 miles. So, I had lots more miles and since it took me 6 years to get 89,000 miles on it I could have driven this car until I was 88 years old with more worries about my survival than worries about my old car’s survival.
Of course there had to be a reason… Well, I was too old for that car! Yes, too old. I do not want to admit that but with a stick shift and no cruise control my body just could not drive it 8 or more hours a day on long trips without getting cramps in my right leg. And, the stick shift was fun but my speed at shifting had slowed which could be a problem especially when I was at a stop heading up a hill and some jerk gets his front bumper close behind me.
Now, there are other reasons for getting an automatic shift one of which is that many people now days can’t drive a stick shift – especially younger people. Yes, I have younger friends and they might want to drive my car. And, these young people do not know how lucky they are not to have to go through the learning experience of pushing in the clutch, pushing and pulling the sifting knob about, letting out the clutch all in one smooth motion without accelerating the motor.
Who taught me and when? Well, my father of course when I was 15 years old. Taking lesions from one’s father, certainly my father was not fun. Now, he didn’t hit me or anything like that, but oh the yelling for he was not a patient man. But, I learned to use a stick shift like everyone did back then if they wanted to drive for automatic transmissions were a rarity. Only one person in town had an automatic transmission and it was a Bar owner who was paralyzed from the waist down so that was his only option.
Of course knowing how to drive a stick shift came in handy many times in my life with various jobs especially driving trucks.
Yes, I had to buy a car with automatic transmission and cruise control if I was to ever take a long trip again like next year. Why a long trip next year? Well because like I have written before I live in upstate New York on Lake Erie during the summer and that is a three-day trip from my winter home in Texas. I say three-day trip, when I was younger I made it in two days, but that is another story.
Believe this or not but just now while I was writing this piece, the phone rang. Guess who was calling? Well, that young girl who sold me the car was asking me how I liked my new car. But, I think she just wanted to hear the voice of a young 60 year-old man.
