Pain of Forgetting

PAIN of FORGETTING

Where did I put my keys? When is her birthday? Sure hate it when my memory fails me.What did you say your name was? That can be embarrassing, especially if it isn’t the first time you have to ask for the person’s name. Alzheimer’s in your family? You know that fear every time you forget something. Losing your memory soon is so unsettling. I know. I experience that haunting feeling. I remember the pain my mother went through when she failed to recall where she placed the cash from her pension cheque. I like to think I’m close to being a normal person. For me those ghosts of you’re losing it, soon fade away. 

What if you were a person who has a poor self-image? Well, you don’t have to guess what that would be like. By reading about Frank in my novel, Baggage burdens.the reader will see the torture that plagues him. Unfortunately, those effects cause Jill and her sister to suffered too. 

“Jill, what I’m going to tell you next you can’t tell another living soul.” 

Jill’s puzzled look nudges Kathy’s explanation. 

“I promised Mom I would tell no one else but you. Mom insisted if I told you, you would promise to tell no one else. She doesn’t want this to get back to Josey.”

Jill quickly agrees and adjusts her body to face her sister.

“Mom told me that at heart Father had an inferiority complex. It mostly disappeared when he became known as a wizard with engines. That changed a few years after I was born. He doubted he could be a good father.”

The explanation that Alice shared with her eldest daughter was that Frank began comparing himself with other fathers at work. The ones that caught his ear were men who had sons, sons who were older and could horse around with their father in various sports activities. In his mind taking his daughter to church, out for ice cream or to the show was a non-event. Frank had nothing to share. Kathy didn’t play piano, dance or sing. He felt like he wasn’t connecting with his children, he couldn’t relate to them. He had nothing to talk about. His inferiority complex kicked in. He concluded he was an inadequate father. 

Frank retained an element of his self-respect by excelling at work and being the life of the party. On a normal day Frank returned home for dinner and talked to his daughters about their interests and their friends. 

“Remember the first school play you asked us all to attend?”

Jill nods.

“Well Father encouraged many of his friends at work to come. He said you were in the play. He failed to realize that you worked on the play. You were a set designer. His friends later asked him which character you were. He had to admit he was wrong. You weren’t an actor. He felt so embarrassed. He didn’t even remember the nature of your involvement in the play. Mom said it took a long time after that before he tried to know what our school involvements were. Later she learned he'd been teased about how little he knew about his children.” 

Because of his fragile father self-image, his mistake shattered his recovering image of a good father.

haiku capsule:                                                                                      

Oh no! I forgot!

My pension money––it’s gone!

Alzheimer’s knocking

Nextblog: Death at the Doorstep