Memory

I’ve been reading more and more about science lately. While in no way mathematically or scientifically gifted, it’s become an area of greater interest. Science is a way to see the world, and to a larger extent all the things that we take for granted in it, with a new set of eyes. It also fosters new appreciations for the infinite complexities of the universe and everything in it. My two favorite topics are memory and the brain.

“Have you ever been driving, heard a song on the radio, then immediately been taken to a certain place, a specific time in your life, or a particular person? Music is second only to smell for its ability to stimulate our memory in a very powerful way. Music therapists who work with older adults with dementia have countless stories of how music stimulates their clients to reminisce about their life.” – Psychology Today.

I think we all could come up with several examples to illustrate the memory/music phenomenon. When I read the above passage, I could immediately think of several instances where music jarred a memory. So much of music is tied to very specific experiences: the time when I was in a rented car driving through Germany with my family and an impossible 1970s Spanish-language song made me think of you; or that one particular evening where we listened to The Fugees; or walking around a snow-covered Gdansk listening to the Pan’s Labyrinth soundtrack. While time travel has yet to be proven scientifically possible, shuffle mode on any MP3 player opens a window into specific memories of the past, sometimes so vivid it’s like you’re reliving them. How does this happen? Is it because the linkage of music to a specific memory somehow separates the memory and makes it more concrete?

Of course, music isn’t the only memory prompt. What can be said of scent? You’re walking down a street and come in contact with a smell that’s so familiar but still takes you a second to place it. The smell of food, the smell of perfume that a friend wears… your brain has formed these connections and associations. Just a few days ago, I was hand washing some sweaters when the smell of the soap became familiar, and I couldn’t help but laugh. The body wash I grabbed to use as soap smelled exactly like the shampoo we use at home for our dogs. The smell combined with the fuzzy, wool sweater I was washing had my mind playing serious tricks on me.

As we continue to learn more about the connections and functions inside of the brain , someday we may be able to see “all of the connections among more than 100 billion neurons and unravel the millions of miles of wires in the brain.” All the advances in technology and computers, but the most sophisticated one is housed in the human body. How about that?