Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Blankie
My stomach woke me up last night — never a good thing — but I had been dreaming about my brother, a squicky eeew kind of dream which brought back some early childhood memories. I almost woke Karen up to tell her, Do you know what he used to do? Stuff which taken out of context sounds awful, but when I think about all the other general squickiness of life back then, it fades into the background. Ambient color.
I remembered my baby blanket. Like Schultz’s Linus, I had a baby blue blankie. Damn thing was falling apart and my father eventually threw it out. Thing is, I haven’t thought about that blanket in years, so where did that memory come from? And what else sits around in my hippocampus, dormant, waiting to spring out with a little prodding?
I have no interest in recovered memory — you know, the fake stuff a suggestible brain manufactures, a fantasy with the street cred of reality. In dreams, my subconscious (which hates me — have I mentioned that? But what other conclusion can I come to when I never ever get the girl?) has tried to convince me of various incestuous dalliances which I know never took place. I wish I could confront this subconscious, grip him by the shoulders, and ask him, What the hell is the matter with you? On the other hand, I’ve learned that the safest thing, the best thing for my mental health, is to give such dreams all the care they deserve: none.
Maybe that’s why my subconscious has it in for me. I keep flipping him the bird.
It was nice, though, remembering that blanket, rather like finding a photo stuffed behind another photo in an old album. Sometimes I see myself as a set of memories. I suppose there’s more, but that’s the part of me I understand. When I look within, those memories are the only thing separating me from a featureless wall. I wish there were more memories (even if most of them are unpleasant, my blanket notwithstanding), enough that I might forget about the blankness altogether.
D.
My brother used to pin me to the ground and then drool on my face. God, boys are gross!
Speaking of things sticking in your memory, I’ll never forget the Pythagorean theorum, thanks to some elaborate Cree or Mohawk story my grade 9 math teacher told us one day, ending with the punchline, the squaw on the hippopotomus is equal to the sons of the squaws on the other two hides.
Sorry — I should get back to work.
Hmmm, mm, hadn’t heard that one before, but the mnemonic I learned for the four strokes of a four-stroke engine (intake, compression, ignition, exhaust) is along the same
lines:
Suck
Squeeze
Bang
Blow
Here’s the mnemonic we learned for the twelve cranial nerves:
Oh Oh Oh to touch and feel a girl’s vagina. Ah, heaven!
O – olfactory
O – optic
O – Oculomotor
T – trochlear
T – trigeminal
A – abducens
F – facial
A – auditory
G – glossopharyngeal
V – vagus
A – spinal Accessory
H – hypoglossal
I have an evil subconscious too! I also had a blankie when I was a kid. I was a thumbsucker, and I coveted the satin edges of blankets to rub over my top lip to bring the calming bliss as only satin can. Everyone hated my thumbsucking and thought it would stop if the blankie was gone. I remember being about four, and my Nana (who wasn’t a relative but the daycare lady) took it and hid it way up high on a top shelf in the closet. I never got it back and I was crushed!! Mom would strip the satins off every blanket I had. (I still sucked my thumb until I was thirteen but it was out of protest by that point.)
I still have dreams of going into that house and trying to find my blanket. I know where it is and as an adult it would be no problem to reach the shelf, but something always happens and I don’t find it. I still long for it deep down in the folds my brain, or middle of my soul. Perhaps where the two just about meet up.
What is it about our families? It’s like they WANT us to be miserable.
People sometimes get around to asking me if my Mother and Father are still alive. I think they’re wondering if they survived me – which they didn’t. I tell them politely, “No, both my parents are dead.” Usually the person asking the question does not know me very well and follows that statement with, “Oh, I’m sorry.” I deadpan back, “Don’t be. The planet wasn’t big enough for all of us.” Either they laugh or they don’t. I don’t because I’m serious. Sad, isn’t it? I’m sure I’m going to catch hell when I die.
I had a blankie too – pink with a satin edge. I took it to kindergarten for nap time. I have no clue what happened to it. I remember thinking when I was 3 or 4 there was a jar of vanishing cream in the top of my closet. When we moved from that house, I was convinced it was left behind because it was “vanished” at the time and the adults didn’t see it.
As far as mnemonics, I’m stuck on mathmatical precedence when no paranthesis are present – my dear aunt sally or multiplication, division, audition and then subtraction. I have to admit I am considering replacing my fondness for mathmatical precedence with suck, squeeze, bang and blow though. It sounds like something I could use in real life more then math.
The mnemonic I remember (hah! See that? Cool) is Two Virgins Make Dull Company, for
True
Variation
Magnetic
Deviation
Compass
Which we used to use in the olden days to keep track of the various forms of compass heading in an aircraft. I don’t know whether they still use it, given that newfangled GPS stuff.
I always said if my kids were thumbsuckers I’d let them do it. There’s no point in fighting something that makes them feel so comfortable they’re relaxed and go to sleep. I never got a thumbsucker, I got cuddlers instead – I now wish they’d suck their thumb and let me sleep.
My kids love their floppy toy, they keep it. they want to wear a hat to bed, I let them. They want to sleep at the wrong end of the bed, sure thing anything you need sweeties. It’s not worth the power struggle. I’m only glad I have girls. I don’t think I could cope with a willy holder. I know it gives comfort but it really annoys me “Is it gonna fall off? Then let it go.”
Lyvvie: thank God. I guess I can finally let it go.
CD: most folks don’t know how to deal with honesty. They would much rather you lie to them.
Dean: so you’re a pilot, too? Multitalented cuss, aren’t you?
Mnemonics, huh? The one I remember most often is “Only one C is necessary but you need two to succeed.”
Which is weird because I’ve always been good at spelling without help. So it’s probably the most useless bit of information I could possibly remember besides the phone number I had when I was in grade 1 – 636-0804.