Magic stairway steps up memory
BURTON W. COLE, EDITOR
By Burton W. Cole
My apartment building features magic memory stairs: As soon as I hit the steps, I remember what I forgot.
I can stand in my living room, pat all my pockets, run down the mental checklist and be fully satisfied that this time, I have everything.
I will step into the hallway, lock my door, pat my pockets again and move to the stairway.
I believe my record is four steps down before the magic stairs flash a message into my brain: “You left your cellphone by the bed” or “You’re going to need that notebook you left on the desk” or “And do you know why it feels breezy? Because you’re not wearing pants.”
My lifetime bucket list includes to, at least once, be able to leave my apartment and walk down the stairs all the way to the bottom on the first try without saying, “Oops” and going back to get whatever it is that I forgot.
If there’s a little more bounce in your step in the morning, it’s probably because you forgot to load something important into your pocket. The stairs will remind you. The stairs never forget.
Years ago, I came across a study that explains why we walk into a room but forget why — it’s the doorway’s fault. Really.
According to science, doorways act like scene changes in movies or a new chapter in novels in our brain. Once we cross the threshold, the brain lets go of whatever it was we were thinking and starts the next scene.
You know how when you’re reading a thriller, the chapter you’re on might have been headed “10:27 p.m., Paris, France,” but flip the page to the next chapter, and the heading is “3:14 a.m., Butte, Montana”?
That’s what the doorway does. It pops your brain out of Paris and into Butte without even packing any luggage, like, say, the thought that sent you into the room in the first place.
I have yet to find a scientific study that explains how stairs make us remember. Is it like the old monster movies that in the final frames flashed “The End,” and a few seconds later added a question mark?
Or maybe it’s like the Star Wars or Marvel franchises — there’s always a sequel just around the corner.
In my case, I lock my door and round the corner to the stairs. And that’s when I remember that it’s time to go back into the movie, er, apartment.
According to a forgetting expert — if I recall correctly, her name is Trish Lee — it’s not so much that we’re forgetful as it is that we have busy minds. Yep, your brain is functioning so well and so much on uncompleted tasks like unpaid bills and turning off the bathwater that it doesn’t have time to remember trivial matters like the car keys, wallet or your lunch.
It’s a good thing that you have the stairs for backup — which is what you have to do when you remember, go back up.
Or, according to productivity experts, you can close those “open loops” by answering your emails, returning calls and letting the cat out of the closet before you attempt to leave the house.
Another helpful hint is the night before, you can set your gym bag, lunch box, library books or whatever it is that you need to remember right in front of the door. That way, if you try to leave without it, you’ll trip over it.
Do not place those things in front of the stairs. You do not want to trip down the stairs. Remember, the stairs never forget. From then on, they will chortle at you every time you walk out your door: “Hey, remember that time you tripped over the tuna fish sandwich and tumbled down the stairs? Hilarious! Especially when halfway down, I reminded you that you forgot your watch.”
Stairs may not forget, but they can be cruel.
The stairs remind you to write to Burt at news@falmouthoutlook.com.
