Tonight I’ll finish reading Meg Wolitzer’s novel The Interestings. I teased my student assistants recently that I’d love to follow the trajectory of their lives over the next thirty years as Meg Wolitzer does her characters.In some ways I have been able to do that for past students, by comparing where they are now (as conveyed to me by Facebook, Linkedin, and campus visits) with the information I have kept in their advising folders—photos, letters, occasionally even a paper they wrote. Recently I was reunited with a former student (selfie available upon request) whose daughter might well be enrolling this year and might even be assigned to work with me. So many memories triggered by the Carroll chimes, familiar places, and familiar faces. Do feel free to share your Carroll Moments with me…
Below are some photos from a number of years ago. Precious Carroll moments which evoke a number of stories about you!
Category: Memory
I’ve been Doing a Lot of Time Traveling Lately
I’ve been doing a lot of time traveling lately partly due to my bed time reading of the marvelous 900+ page paperback The Time Traveler’s Almanac. I’m tempted to try out Mr. Peabody’s Wayback machine.
This is also the time of year where I am flooded with memories of my time at Carroll (and my (in)formative years at Oberlin College and Ohio State). And I whistle a lot while walking across campus as I process this flood of memories. Once I get the semester successfully put to bed (with fond farewells to graduates at Commencement on Sunday), I need to turn my attention to sorting through photos, thoughts and memories in preparation for Mom’s memorial service on May 17.
Little Brother Bruce and Big Sister Connie Sue kindly sent me all the photos from Mom’s Sun City Residence. Can you pick out Connie, David, and Bruce as they looked in 1955? I wonder what we were thinking then? I think that I had gotten over my desire to run away from home because of the birth of Bruce and was trying to teach him how to read. I hadn’t yet started teasing Sis, though I may already have inadvertently locked her in the bathroom. Here are some of the events shaping our thinking then.
I can vaguely remember some of the radio show and TV shows. What do you remember from 1955? What would you like to remember when you are 65? 90?
Thanks for the Memories…
Perhaps because I just recently read that the CEO of Evernote wants me to be able to remember everything, I’ve been thinking a lot about elephants lately and about Jorge Luis Borges‘ Funes Memorius and about those Seven Sins of Memory outlined by Psychologist Daniel Schacter. One of the downsides joys of being liberally educated is that one sees interconnections among seemingly disparate things.
Based upon my thinking about the links above, I’m convinced that I don’t want a perfect memory—nor do I want technological tools for remembering everything. Still, as I grow older I am increasingly sensitive to issues of memory loss. I am haunted by the descriptions of dementia so graphically and accurately described in Walter Mosely’s novel The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey.
Here is an interview with the author.
There is so much hype interest today in using technology to improve one’s brain power, health and well-being. Try, for example, doing an online search on “brain power.” You’ll be overwhelmed with the results though (hopefully) be underwhelmed by the validity of the claims. The challenge is to know how to decide which claims are “snake oil,” which represent vaporware, and which are science-based. Consider these three Internet “tools” (none of which I am endorsing but each of which I am investigating with my students) … and their promises and claims of success at improving one’s life
Which (if any) in your informed judgment is based upon valid psychological science? Which is merely entertainment? Which make false or unverifiable claims? Which is patently wrong?
Here is a video of some evidence-based things we can do to improve our health and psychological well-being. The first presenter, Dr. Michelle Braun, is a Carroll graduate who recently returned to campus to receive the Joseph E. Runkel Excellence in Psychology award. She is also the first speaker in the accompanying video. Her message is uplifting, well-presented, and data based. Thank you, Michelle, for your advocacy and for serving as a touchstone for my learning. You continue to enrich my life and those of my students.
