# Have you forgotten more than you now know?



## Bretrick (Nov 27, 2021)

Memories fade then disappear. I have forgotten so much of my past experiences that I posit I have forgotten more than I now know. 
Is this question Double Dutch to you?


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## oldpop (Nov 27, 2021)

Not yet but I guess I am working on it.


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## Verisure (Nov 27, 2021)

*" ... but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now." *
Bob Dylan


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## dseag2 (Nov 27, 2021)

Only the stuff I've chosen to forget.


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## RadishRose (Nov 27, 2021)

Reply hazy, ask again later.


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## Verisure (Nov 27, 2021)

RadishRose said:


> Reply hazy, ask again later.


Outlook not so good.


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## Warrigal (Nov 27, 2021)

Bretrick said:


> Memories fade then disappear. I have forgotten so much of my past experiences that I posit I have forgotten more than I now know.
> Is this question Double Dutch to you?


Definitely not Double Dutch at all. 

I've forgotten a lot of names from the past - really forgotten, not just misplaced them. I cannot for the life of me remember the last name of my first boyfriend. I remember his first name was Bill, but Bill Who? has no answer. I have no mementos to aid my memory so it is probably lost for good now.

I've forgotten most of what I was required to learn during my uni studies. It is all very hazy now but one thing I have not forgotten is how to research and look things up when I need to. .

Of my travels, I sometimes need to look in the photo albums to see exactly where we went and who we met but the memories of how I felt about special places are vivid still.


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## Bretrick (Nov 27, 2021)

Warrigal said:


> Definitely not Double Dutch at all.
> 
> I've forgotten a lot of names from the past - really forgotten, not just misplaced them. I cannot for the life of me remember the last name of my first boyfriend. I remember his first name was Bill, but Bill Who? has no answer. I have no mementos to aid my memory so it is probably lost for good now.
> 
> ...


A lot of my memories are nothing more than smatterings of events past. Very difficult to remember definitively.
Also, I went through a period where I thought a lot of my memories may have been false memories.


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## Gary O' (Nov 27, 2021)

Have you forgotten more than you now know?​
May be

I write
about my experiences, friends, family





I'll check back in awhile

Might better make it sooner than later


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## Aunt Bea (Nov 27, 2021)

I remember it all, but the priorities have changed and the deck has been reshuffled several times since I stopped working.


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## Murrmurr (Nov 28, 2021)

My kids are always amazed when it becomes obvious that I have absolutely no recollection of the "memories I made for them". Like, on Thanksgiving we were sitting around the table telling stories and my son said to his kids, "Ask your grampa about when he sent me out on a midnight scavenger hunt." And they did, and I didn't know what the hell he was talking about.

But apparently, this happened.


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## Aunt Bea (Nov 28, 2021)

Murrmurr said:


> My kids are always amazed when it becomes obvious that I have absolutely no recollection of the "memories I made for them". Like, on Thanksgiving we were sitting around the table telling stories and my son said to his kids, "Ask your grampa about when he sent me out on a midnight scavenger hunt." And they did, and I didn't know what the hell he was talking about.
> 
> But apparently, this happened.


It’s always interesting which memories stick with us for life.  

What’s insignificant to one is life changing to another.


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## hollydolly (Nov 28, 2021)

Murrmurr said:


> My kids are always amazed when it becomes obvious that I have absolutely no recollection of the "memories I made for them". Like, on Thanksgiving we were sitting around the table telling stories and my son said to his kids, "Ask your grampa about when he sent me out on a midnight scavenger hunt." And they did, and I didn't know what the hell he was talking about.
> 
> But apparently, this happened.


Yup that happens to me too... my daughter gets extremely irritated when I can't remember  things  * sigh* ..but like @Gary O' ..I keep journals..have to...


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## Mr. Ed (Nov 28, 2021)




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## Verisure (Nov 28, 2021)

Bretrick said:


> .....I went through a period where I thought a lot of my memories may have been false memories.


I know what you mean. I've been in quite a few situations/places in recent history but I'm afraid to tell people because they might think I'm Walter Mitty. Now and then I begin to wonder myself so I have to dig up my old passports to check the dates and stamps to prove to myself that I really was there ... and at that time. I'm still hesitant to tell people but at least I know what I know and bugger those who think of me as a liar.


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## Tom 86 (Nov 28, 2021)

No, there are things that bring back old memories.  You think you forgot some things.  Then you run into an old friend & get to talking about old times & that brings back lots of good or sometimes bad memories.


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## JustBonee (Nov 28, 2021)

Murrmurr said:


> My kids are always amazed when it becomes obvious that I have absolutely no recollection of the "memories I made for them". Like, on Thanksgiving we were sitting around the table telling stories and my son said to his kids, "Ask your grampa about when he sent me out on a midnight scavenger hunt." And they did, and I didn't know what the hell he was talking about.
> 
> But apparently, this happened.




I am finding that is happening to me when I get together with the family now....  one situation from  the past, but  with many different versions of it  from everyone.


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## Sassycakes (Nov 28, 2021)

My mind is gone. I remember vividly things that happened when I was young yet at times I can't remember what I did yesterday.


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## Judycat (Nov 28, 2021)

The memories are there in the subconscious mind. Like a library where books are being added all the time, the oldest ones are shoved ever further back in the stacks where you'd have to make an effort to dig them out. Sometimes one falls off the shelf with a bang and it comes to mind by surprise, not always good by the way.


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## Irwin (Nov 28, 2021)

I forget movies that I watched more than a few years ago, which is a good thing. I can watch them again like it's the first time.


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## Smiley Holly (Nov 28, 2021)

There are things from my past I choose to forget and some that I have lost along the way which I really have no idea why. I am only 57 years old so most things from my past I can recall unless it is really from my earliest days of childhood. I hope I do have a good memory for a long time to come.


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## feywon (Nov 28, 2021)

i am blessed/cursed with an excellent, tho not quite eidetic (what is popularly known as 'photographic') memory.  i'm glad it's not eidetic---i don't need to know phone numbers from 60 years ago, every street address i ever lived at every teacher's name.  i have memories going back to between 1-2 years old, both good and bad.  Most of the good ones are of being outdoors feeling free, as if on my own--but always under somebody's watchful eye. When i was older i could duck the surveillance and face the consequences later.

@Warrigal said "...but one thing I have not forgotten is how to research and look things up when I need to." My Dad emphasized this when we were kids, that what was crucial was knowing how to get accurate info when you need it. In those days it was not as easy/quick as now, but one of the many gifts Dad gave me was teaching me to not be afraid to ask question. And if you wanted to know something and were in a time crunch--ask someone who's knowledgeable, who works with things or in the field of the info you need. Most people love to talk about their work, are flattered when someone shows an interest.

But even tho it is is some ways easier these days thanks to internet, we still have to consider the source of the info---their 'credentials' and if they may influenced by some bias.  i love being able to quickly check the spelling of an artist's or scientist's name when i'm posting something about them, or fact check my memory of when some 'big' event happened. Example: i know both MLK, Jr. and RFK were assassinated in first half of 1968 just a few months apart--but if it's relevant to a post i'm making i double check the precise dates.

To bring full circle tho not reliable 100% eidetic memory--my ability to visualize something --sections of a map, streets i've traveled, pages of a book--has helped me greatly in life, especially when i went to college as an 'older' student. i could often visualize passages defining or explaining things a test question was about or the notes i took in lectures.  Once a psych professor during a class about memory asked if any of us could say the alphabet backwards. i raised my hand and did it saying each letter clearly, distinctly (unlike when we rattle it off forwards) but without stopping to think anywhere.  My young classmates (much closer than i was to the age when every classroom had the alphabet somewhere visible, often over the blackboard) were impressed. The professor asked how i did it. i told her i pictured those large letters that were displayed in my elementary school classrooms and simply read them off starting at right hand end instead of left. Which gave her a perfect lead in to her talk about different kinds of memory.


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## fuzzybuddy (Nov 28, 2021)

I don't remember high school trigonometry, & algebra. I had 4 years of Latin, today zilch. I studied my head off for Nursing School. What I remember about human anatomy is people have a head, and possibly two arms? It seems all that knowledge was three lifetimes ago.


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## Don M. (Nov 28, 2021)

I'm just glad that I remember items that are of importance at my age.  I sometimes have a "flash back" to something that happened years ago, but not too often.


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## dseag2 (Nov 28, 2021)

Irwin said:


> I forget movies that I watched more than a few years ago, which is a good thing. I can watch them again like it's the first time.


I forget movies that I watched a week ago!  

Funny, story.  We went to see Wicked a couple of months ago.  It had been years since we'd seen it.  I got up and started to leave the theater after the first act and my partner asked me where I was going.  I said "I thought it was over and they had cancelled intermission due to Covid".  I didn't remember any of the second half, so yes, it was liking seeing it all for the first time!


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## Lewkat (Nov 28, 2021)

My memory is too good for my health, I can tell you.  Like an elephant.


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