Anyone who knows me knows that I have a really hard time remembering things. It's not an age thing...I've been this way all my life (at least I think I have - I really don't remember.) I'm pretty sure it's an ADD thing.
It can be the little things that happen to us all...forgetting a name now and then. My husband learned early on in our marriage to introduce himself to whoever I was talking to because there was a really good chance I couldn't recall their name on demand. It could take hours, sometimes days before the gears would click and I could recall their name and where I knew them from.
Add to this already rocky memory the fact that I've worked with children most of my life so there's their name, parent names, siblings name, their friends...you get the picture. I tell my students each year about the time I called my son Humphrey...Humphrey was our dog. They know if I will mess up my own son's name, there's a good chance I'll mess up theirs. They don't take offense. A lot of them just tell me to call them Humphrey so it's an in-class joke.
But it's not just names. Recently my husband and I came out of a store and he mentioned remembering when that location used to be the "Aim" store. I looked at him with a puzzled look and he said, "You remember. Aim for the best!" I shook my head - don't remember it. That's when he told me I'd worked there! Okay, my memory is far worse than I thought!
My sweet sister is always puzzled that I don't remember things from our growing up. I do remember a few things - the tree we climbed that had flowers that smelled like bananas. My friends and I would climb up and use cans with a string to talk to each other from tree to tree. We were secret agents.
I remember being in my first grade play and having a mushroom costume that my mama had ingeniously fashioned from an old umbrella. Or the time my cute new one-piece pajamas were too long so she cut them off and hemmed them, only to discover she'd cut off one leg and one arm (hey, flowy was in style in the 70's!) We laughed and laughed and she cut off the other arm and did some amazing stitch work. I had the cutest hot pink pjs at the pajama party.
So see, I do remember some things.
Some things I wish I could forget - an unkind word. Usually, it's that - an unkind word. My gift of gab gets me into trouble more often than I want to admit. Sometimes people overthink what I say and take it the wrong way. I should have a sign to carry around that says, "Take what I say at face value - there is no underlying message or intent. Don't spend a lot of time thinking about it - I obviously didn't take much time thinking before it left my mouth."
And that's where all this comes around to. Since I don't remember what I say, I'd better make sure that the words that come out of my mouth are sweet because, as they say, I may have to eat them. How will I do that? As always, God's Word gives me the "how-to" to make sure I don't have to worry about what I say. It's right there in Psalm 19:14
May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
Be acceptable in Your sight,
Lord, my rock and my Redeemer.
I don't have to remember what I say as long as I follow His Words. And one day, when I get to heaven, if I said anything worth remembering, I know it will have directed someone else to be there with me. And we can laugh and laugh for the foolishness of my words that God somehow redeemed and used for good...and hopefully, I'll even remember saying them.
Photo by Rob Mulally on Unsplash
