I got you there. Most people know one or the other word but seldom both. It proves, you know, that if we don’t know words to say disorganized, or chaotic, we would, you know, just have to say, you know, kittywampus but never juxtaposition, you know, which it ain’t.

The point is that if we don’t know the word describing it, we cannot communicate it to another person, or even to ourselves.

Take memory loss. We all suffer some of it and but we seldom know how to explain it unless we find the words that properly define it. I just found out about Event Based Prospective Memory (EBPM) and Time Based Prospective Memory (TBPM). You may have a problem with both of those but you didn't know you had the problem because you could not differentiate between them, nor did you know there was a name for them.

The German poet Heinrich Heine once said something like this: “Happy are the bones you don’t know about.” It could be said about the memory problem. As long as you don’t know about it by definition, you can always just ignore it. Now where was I?

Here are examples of both memory losses. You drive by the library and it reminds you stop to return a book you have in the back seat. That is EBPM.

You look at your watch to make sure you get to your doctor’s appointment at 2 PM. That is TBPM.

Both of these are affected by various conditions, mostly by age, but also some by diseases and by medications you take.

I used to go to the grocery store without a list and get everything we needed. Now I go with a list and if it is not on the list I tend to just walk by the item and do not notice that we may need it, but I did not put it on the list because it was so obvious that I just could not forget it. EBPM trouble.

I showed up at the doctor’s office at exactly the right time. It was the wrong day. TBPM trouble.

I can imagine most of you nodding in agreement, because this problem shows up at all ages. I just found out that I am taking a medication that has a major impact on patients’ EBPM. They show it for each age group up to age 90. It is worst for the 85-90 group. I am lucky that it doesn’t apply to me since I am not in that group.