BEFORE THE FIRE GOES OUT {M, 1-27-25]

BEYOND WINTER: Irrelevant Forgetfulness of An Old Man—BEFORE THE FIRE GOES OUT {M, 1-27-25]

 

When I was in college, a common exclamation was, “Forget you!” I suppose Keota, Iowa—at least the Presbyterians there—might want to say that to me.

“Keota” in the Native American language of eastern Iowa means “the fire has gone out,” which is highly appropriate, for the fire has gone out in my memory about Keota. I don’t have even a glimmer of memory about Keota, or the Presbyterian Church there, even though I apparently preached there almost every Sunday for three months in 1972, when I was a PhD student at the U of Iowa.

I know this because I have been going through files—many, many files—of old stuff I have saved through the years, recycling most of it so that my children will not have to mess with it when I’m gone. One of those files is full of Sunday morning worship bulletins from the Keota Presbyterian Church, bulletins that list my name beside “Sermon.” Not only my name is listed beside “Sermon,” but there is a title each week, too. They sound a lot like my sermons; every title has “story” in it!

I was a Presbyterian preacher during my U of Iowa days because the Director of the University School of Religion was James Spalding, an ordained Presbyterian himself, and the de facto “bishop” of Presbyterianism in eastern Iowa. Whenever a church was between or without a preacher, it would call up Jim and ask him to send out somebody to fill the pulpit. I was technically Jim’s Teaching Asst, but neither of us did much teaching. I was more of an assistant director, doing whatever he assigned me, which was often going to meetings of the trustees or potential donors, since he didn’t like meetings. I didn’t, either, but I needed the money. Both from being Jim’s assistant, and from filling at little churches where he sent me. Including Keota. I guess.

The next year, I pastored, not just preached, parttime, at two Presbyterian Churches, Red Oak Grove and Stanwood, about the same distance northeast from Iowa City that Keota is southeast from there. I remember almost everything about them. So why don’t I remember Keota from the year before?

Forgetfulness is one of the main complaints of old people. Recently one of my former colleagues was very helpful to Helen as she negotiated some tricky insurance paper work. When she thanked him, he said, “Oh, I owed you. Your husband gave me the best advice I ever got.” Now I’m trying to remember what I told him. I could use some good advice. But…

I recently figured up that I have known almost ten thousand people by first and last names. In sorting through old files, I have found notes from many of them. I don’t recognize most of the names, or if I recognize the name, I have no memory of the person who goes with it. That’s probably not surprising. Most of us can’t relate to more than a few dozen people at a time, keeping them sorted out in our minds. That’s for a good reason. It would be overwhelming to me to remember ten thousand people. My brain protects me by dropping out those that seem least important right now.

So, as you do some old-age forgetting, remember that it’s because you have so much more stuff to keep in your memory vault now, but you have no more storage space that you ever had. Your brain is just protecting you by dropping out the irrelevant stuff.

I hope I can remember that, at least more than I remember Keota.

John Robert McFarland