Hindsight is not 20/20

Memories are an imperfect thing. Eye witnesses to crimes are not reliable testimony. It is not hard to implant a false memory. A bad outcome does not always mean you made the wrong choice. Conversely, a good outcome does not always mean you made the right choice.

Memories are tainted with the context of where we are, right now. There have been experiments with mice showing that when they remember something, they are actually recreating the synapses of that memory. The irony is that the purest memory possible is a forgotten one, lost in an amnesiac’s brain. That’s assuming it’s not overwritten by newer memories.

If we take this to be true in people’s brains, which some people are starting to believe, that means that thinking back on an event, your impressions are clouded by the ultimate outcome. All of the telltale signs you can’t believe you didn’t see? Maybe they were never there. The risk is that by dwelling on a particular memory, continuously re-contextualizing it based on your perception of the outcome actually leeches out lessons that may not actually be relevant, and deaden the lessons one should take away.

Ultimately, one truly does not know what would have happened if they made a different choice, simply because they did not make that choice. Aggregate the experience, learn from it, and make better choices in the future.

On the importance of food

I don’t enjoy thinking about food.

It feels like a confession, to say that. Coworkers sometimes show off their elaborate lunches, or describe some fantastic meal they enjoyed at a wedding celebration or high end restaurant, and while those things are nice, I honestly do not care.

There is nothing on the Food Network that I want to watch. I’ve never taken a picture of a meal that I am going to eat.

This is not to say that I don’t enjoy eating food. My wife is a fabulous chef and has made some amazing stuff. She is the polar opposite of me in this regard. She plans around meals, and a lot of strategizing is spent figuring out how to prepare a given meal. One of the more unpleasant things to happen in her day is for something to come up that prevents her from making the dinner she’d planned to make. This is not too uncommon right now, what with two young children at home right now.

This is a problem, largely because food apathy inhibits food creativity. My wife can open the fridge, take stock of what’s in there, and plan out a meal. I can open the fridge, take stock of what’s in there, and go and make a PB&J. They’re simple, tasty, and fill be up, at least at first. Human systems thrive on variety, it seems. The first day, a PB&J will last until lunch. The next day, it lasts until 10. The day after, until 8. By then end of the week, I’ll finish the PB&J and still be starving. The same experience has happened with eggs, and any number of breakfast items. I could mix things up a bit, but that takes a lot of planning and effort, as well as prep time, and I’d much rather use that time for sleeping.

I learned in college that when choosing between eating and sleeping, sleeping wins. I also learned that after using the technique of drinking lots of water to stave off hunger for two straight days, it never works again.

I’m hungry.