Learning the Forgotten

It’s a skill that I have yet not become even remotely good at; in fact, I’m utterly rubbish at it. Although, even remembering to (or discovering) the importance of the art of learning the forgotten is a positive step. What I mean by this is learning something ages ago, storing it in your mind and then consequently forgetting it about five minutes later. Some of it is mundane, like buying a packet of Pork Scratchings back in 2000 and noting like they taste of gone off tripe with salt sprinkled on them. Only for last week to find myself in Sainsbury’s noticing a packet of Pork Scratchings hanging in between the wine and the cans of lager. Hmm, they look interesting, I wonder what they taste like? Next thing I’m doing is throwing in a packet into my basket and outside popping one of those dry curly pieces of saturated fat into my mouth. Rancid. And then I get the flash back of the first time I tasted them, after buying them from some garage outside Birmingham somewhere. Why didn’t I remember?

And then there’s things that help me with work and everyday life which I should of learned at school (and quite possibly did but forgot), like when is it appropriate to use semi colons. I learned about its use in 2006 when an employee of the local library picked up something I’d wrote, which I had left behind. As she ran towards me she must of glanced at what I had written because as she handed me back the piece of paper she told me, you need some semi colons in there. To which I replied that I haven’t got a clue about when I should use one. She then spent five minutes with me, explaining that it should be used when you want more emphasis than just a comma. Yet, I can tell you now I have pretty much totally forgotten about semi colons and where they should be applied. I just go off tapping away and inserting commas and full stops where I see fit and never consider that perhaps a semi colon should be used, until that is, someone points it out to me and I say, oh yeah, but inside I’m beating myself up for not learning/remembering hard enough the time the kind lady in the library explained it all.

Also, there are the aspects of emotion that I forget, even though at the time, it felt so good that I said to myself that I’d never forget how that feeling was. Only to forget, until I feel it again and it’s like bumping into an old chum, it all comes flooding back. A most recent example was the feeling of accomplishment. When I was being overwhelmed at work I was just sinking into the mire and so was beginning to think like this, starting to be closed minded as my body shutdown what it considered superfluous activities in order to save energy to get things done. And I remember thinking, this is crap, I don’t like feeling like this. Yet I have been in this situation and felt this way before. And when I finally complete my tasks and projects there is this superb feeling of elation of finishing but also at conquering what I thought was too difficult. I become reenergised and I note that the thing did not break me and so my capacity for accommodating stress has expanded a little further. I need to remember this because although I’m not out of the mire at the moment, I have one more big week and then I genuinely hope it will all be over and I can get that feeling of accomplishment.

But there are others, like telling someone who really deserves it to piss off. Regardless of the context of the situation, if someone deserves those words bequeathed to them, then when it’s delivered you should get a feeling of satisfaction that outweighs any repercussion. Whether it be in front of a tribunal or a severe head smacking, if they deserve it then you should still feel that justification for telling them so. Sometimes I forget that feeling of justification and satisfaction because of the context that surrounds the situation and the over riding notion, that we should not swear to each other because we are adults. Yeah right. I’ve told local hoodies to do this, as well as work colleagues (although years ago) and when I’ve said it I remember it feeling right. To me, it was a concise way of communicating what I wanted them to do and I shouldn’t forget that sometimes people need that conveyed.

So now I have discovered about learning the forgotten I’m hoping I can start to develop the skill of wrenching out stuff I learned ages ago and not have to learn them all over again. Or, what is more likely, that I will forget about this all and learning about the forgotten will sound nothing more than a 90’s Britpop album title. I guess that’s why I’ve posted it on the blog, before I forget!

In other news, I discovered this song for the first time on Friday afternoon. I immediately fell in love with it and knew my weekend was going to be good. Right, I'm off to get high on Peruvian coffee.