Wake Me Up, ASAP!

I had one of my many recurring nightmares the other night. This was the one in which I’m back in Physical Chemistry class in college. Physical Chemistry, affectionately known as P-chem, can be loosely described as Chemistry, Physics, Quantum Mechanics and Calculus all wadded up and tossed out as something assumed to be comprehensible to human beings. If you are not frightened by this depiction or if you took P-chem and liked it, you are either way too smart to be reading this blog, or you’re that smart but you need the comic relief to get over yourself for the second-and-a-half it will take you to read it.

As luck would have it, my adored Organic Chemistry class took place in the same room as, and immediately prior to, the dreaded P-chem. All was bliss in that room as long as Organic was going on in there. But once that class ended, the room morphed into a torture chamber where unspeakable horrors took place. As the P-chem prof walked into the room, my right leg went stiff as a board from hip to toes, and I developed excruciating pain in my neck and shoulders. I had to sneak a paper bag from my backpack, duck my head under my desk, and breathe into it in an often-futile attempt to prevent hyperventilation. I distinctly remember that there was one session in which the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle was discussed. What I took home from that lesson was My Certainty Theory, which was that I was certain to fail P-chem. I should have had my first inkling back then that I was entering the Insanity Zone, because I would show up for exams as if going to witness my own execution and arrive early to get a good seat.

Not to brag, but by some miracle I got an A in the Nightmare Course. I think that explains a lot. I often wonder what is wrong with me when I can’t think of relatively simple words, such as “confused.” Apparently my brain is in urgent need of exfoliation. The dead cells are suffocating the ones still desperately trying to function. All too often I find myself blabbering along only to hear myself stammering, “uh, uh, uh…” I know that I know the word I want, it may even be monosyllabic, but it simply refuses to be summoned forth. If the person I’m talking to is either kind or impatient, they put me out of my misery by supplying the word that is obviously escaping me. I’m convinced that most of the words that I have ever known are still in my brain somewhere, but the search engine designed to bring them up when I need them has certainly suffered damage.

I blame most of this brain fog on organ overuse due to my inexplicable determination to kick rear in P-chem. The rest I blame on raising kids. As a real smart guy named Sam Levenson said, “Insanity is hereditary; you get it from your children.” Now that the grandchildren are arriving, that damage seems to be reversing itself. It seems that there is something restorative in watching your kids struggle through payback. Sorry, kids; no ill will intended. Those mental faculties of yours should return one day, given that you manage to survive Stage One (children) and advance to Stage Two (grandchildren). But that, as they say, is another story. For now I’ll just content myself with the thought that when I find myself back in P-chem, the good news is that I will eventually wake up with hope of regenerating brain cells lost. Somebody pass the coffee and the crossword puzzle, please…