An Aging Brain

It's finally happened. I'm officially old. Not only am I home blogging on a Saturday night, sad enough in itself, but I have joined the ranks of the senile. I've never had a particularly good memory, which, while sometimes causing frustrations to my friends (we went there? really?) at least enables me to enjoy a book or film numerous times since I can't quite recall all the details.

But, despite my short-term memory, I've always thought that certain personal details were impossible to forget. I easily remember the names of my pets and my friends and places I went on vacation. I used to laugh at my mom for recording the names of all my teachers and classes in a childhood scrapbook. After being imprisoned with these people for an entire year, she expected me to forget them? I wish, right? I would like to get rid of most of my memories of Junior High, and most of school for that matter, but they stay right there, giving me my neuroses.

But today, while telling an anecdote about my eight grade Earth Science teacher, I found that I couldn't remember his name. Granted, Coach...Something wasn't a stellar educator or a mentor by any means. I remember playing lots of poker for Jolly Ranchers in his class. I also used his oft-granted "free time" to become top in the year in the card games Spit and Speed, vying for dominance with a loud girl named Rochelle.

Coach What's-His-Name was, like many teachers in rural Texas, a coach first, and a teacher second. I do remember that his dark brown hair was in the process of balding and that he seemed fairly gentle and soft-spoken for a coach. I remember he had once been a weatherman. I seem to recall that we made kites one day as a "science experiment". But his name is still lost in the recesses of my brain case.

I easily remember the names of other Texas coach/teachers I had. Coach Ledbetter designated boisterous students (I was not one) "spastic nimrods". Coach Blinko flashed a smile and called me "Blondie", making me want to punch out his gold tooth. Coach Thompson, pumped up on steroids, advised the class not to get hooked on nasal sprays. Coach Kennedy managed to waste an entire year on Texas History, of which I remember little other than the Alamo. There was also a particularly evil Coach Charles who I purposely re-arranged my schedule to avoid having as a teacher. (I'm not surprised I remember him; wickedness is branded onto the psyche. This guy had made my brother keep running during an asthma attack and given me detention for dropping an envelope with my name on it in the lunch room. No way was I going to submit to an entire year of World History with him. I won in the end, so there.) But the Science guy, who I did have class with for two whole semesters, is still coming up blank.

It doesn't really matter, of course. He hardly played a very important role in my education, and I hadn't thought about him in years. When my synapses finally fire and his name sparks up, I will shrug and go, "Oh yeah." I could even dig out my scrapbook and read in my mom's handwriting, "Eighth grade Earth Science: Coach ***". But it's not worth jostling the other blessedly hidden memories that might erupt from handling that scrapbook. It has pictures of me at age thirteen. Not nice.

So, I will just have to come to terms with my slowly rotting brain. I expect to soon be having conversations in which I talk about that recent movie, you know, the one based on that book--I think the cover was blue--starring that guy who's married to that woman from that show. You know, the one with the dog.