Learning later in life

I am away next week, on an intensive French course in Québec City, so the next post will be April 4.
This is a thinly-disgised girlfriend getaway; I am going with my friend Alyson, and we intend to be good students not only of our second language, but of the culinary delights of this scenic old city.

So, I should not say "thinly! But we hope that walking back and forth to class will mitigate a few teatimes with macarons and a celebratory big dinner at Le Pied Bleu.

I am not worried about my waist, but I am worried about my brain, and therefore my ability to get the most out of the course. As I age, my thirst to learn is mitigated by noticeable and highly frustrating memory erosion. Oh, it goes in, and comprehension is fine—but retention is not what it once was.

When I read on Kindle, the pages do not show a header—so I responded to a recent inquiry about what I was reading by saying, "I have no idea but it is by Annie Proulx. " ("Barkskins"; I had to look at the title page.)

I get the 'click' I have always felt when a concept or pattern settles into my brain, except in several days, without continual repetition, my new nugget of grammar or vocabulary goes the way of the geometry theorems I learned in 8th grade: familiar, but not retrievable.

Alyson's wife does Brain Gym exercises to continue mental stimulation, and takes Great Books courses. I admire that; you have to do something, and just like physical exercise, if it's an activity you enjoy, you'll stick to it.

My current brain stimulation comes from those year-round classes, the choice of "harder books", and my annual July-August vacation from the Internet. During that time I make a particular effort to dig into long essays, explore genres and forms outside my usual, and spend more time in nature, usually on foot.

I already count the weeks toward my unplugging because I suspect the blurry barrage doesn't help my retention. Ross Douthat, in his op-ed piece, "Resist the Internet" says, "The internet is not the opioid crisis; it is not likely to kill you... But it requires you to focus intensely, furiously, and constantly on the ephemera that fills a tiny little screen, and experience the traditional graces of existence—your spouse and friends and children, the natural world, good food and great art—in a state of perpetual distraction."

Nor is the Internet a sterling way to learn, because it places a low demand on cognition, delivering the vast majority of its material as small, declarative chunks that require a low level of mental processing.

This spring and summer, I want to select some new stimulation. I am curious about what you do to use your brain, especially its abilities of recall.

I have found anxiety about retention of new information makes my memory even worse, and, like anyone who saw "Still Alice", wonder if this is the beginning of dementia. Sometimes I can laugh, such as the time when I stood before a salesperson searching for the word for the coat I wanted. I'd used it most of my life, but it had tiptoed off just over...there. (Duffle).

Here's a joke:

Three women meet for coffee. The first says, "I think I'm losing my memory. I was standing in my kitchen with a jar of peanut butter in my hand, and I couldn't for the life of me remember what I was going to do with it."

The second woman says, "Oh, me too! I was on my landing, looking out the window for just a few seconds, and then I couldn't recall if I had been going up or down."

The third says, "Well, nothing like that has happened to me yet, touch wood."

She raps her knuckles on the table, then says "Oh! There's the door! I'll get it."


See you on April 4; I won't forget!