Toe in the Water

The Old Enemy

The Old Enemy

I may joke about it but the fear is real. As the years roll on and the word you had decided to use is suddenly gone before you can type it, the prospect of senility creeps from the shadowed corners and I have to wonder. Is this how it starts? Is this increasing elusiveness of the exact word a foretaste of things to come? Will this slight annoyance develop until the mind is a babbling idiot and I a drooling vessel of half remembered episodes of long ago?

Of course, I’ve always had moments when the necessary word plays hide and seek, leaving me with some substitute that doesn’t quite say what I mean. It’s almost a definition of life that this precisely timed forgetfulness strikes at unfortunate moments. But this is different now. It used to be occasional but now it’s almost every day.

And yes, I have Andrea to help me in the hunt for the mischievous absconder. It’s true too that, if I just do something else for a bit, it’ll return and I’ll shout it out in triumph. Yet, if this acceleration continues, I’ll be spending all my time hunting or waiting for the return of the prodigal. In the meantime, whatever I was in the process of constructing will proceed to the great forgetory of my mind and be lost forever. I was always one to strike while the iron was hot.

It’s like imagining what it’s like to become blind. So terrible as to not be countenanced. And I try not to think of it but it lurks in the background, a constant presence.

I comfort myself with the thought that, if I keep using the mind, it’ll remain in basically usable shape. Use it or lose it, they say, and I’m sure there’s sense in that. It’s supposed to work for the kidneys, so I see no reason why it shouldn’t work for the brain as well.

At the very least, I should be able to annoy these good folks in WdC for a few years yet.


Word count: 347