Huh?! Your Phone Number Isn’t Just the Number 2?

In a day and age where there are just SO many numbers to remember and so many combinations of passwords and usernames and accounts my brain has become fried.  Seriously, between work and home I have 5 different emails ALL with different usernames and passwords!  I have work computer logins and passwords, home computer logins and passwords, accounts, phone numbers, SSN, License number, birthdays, anniversaries, billing due dates….AAAACK!!!

So why am I mentioning this?  Because folks, I am admitting right here, right now….I have failed. 

What have I failed with?  Remembering people’s phone numbers.  *sigh*

This really bothers me.  I feel like that was a special connection I had to people when I knew their phone number.  I use to be SO good at remembering phone numbers and would remember everyone’s phone number.  When I got my first cell phone I had some numbers in there, but I would rather DIAL the number than go to the contact book and call from there.  When T & I first started dating, ok and even now, he had to constantly ask me what certain phone numbers where… even his own.  (T. is old-fashioned.  He doesn’t remember phone numbers he gets them out a phone book which is why we still have a landline.) 

But somewhere along the way, as my brain became infiltrated with a lot of this technological bullshit that is suppose to make our lives “easier”, I was forced to remember more numbers and usernames and passwords.  And because I seemed to be running out of usable brain space I had to take “shortcuts” where necessary so I didn’t forget anything and so I could instead continue to have room for yet another new stupid internet thing that I just had to sign up for online.  

And the big “shortcut” I took was not remembering people’s phone numbers anymore.

Seriously, do you want my old phone number growing up before I was a teenager….878-7728.  I am 30 and should NOT still remember that number, but it is in there just taking up space.  As well as are some other phone numbers that I really shouldn’t remember.  And I imagine I remember those numbers because I HAD to dial them….you know on the rotary phones.  There was no quick dialing.  But ask me what my sister’s phone number is…go ahead. Yeah, it is 3 Send. Yes I push the number THREE on my phone and push SEND! What?!  How can I NOT remember her number, she is my sister. I text her daily and call her frequently enough that I should know it.

I can remember my phone number growing up and my home number….but I have NO IDEA what many people’s phone numbers are.  You want to play a mean joke on me, then just switch up my phone number with different contacts.  I won’t know any difference until I call them. 

I mean I work with numbers daily and will off the top of my head know the matter number for a case (and we have thousands of cases) but I can’t remember my parents cell phone numbers! WHAT is up with that?!    

I am trying to make an effort to remember more phone numbers.  I currently remember the beginning of Kristen’s cell phone number, meaning the area code and the first 3 numbers but that is it.  And the worst part is that it just seems like the more I try to stuff in my head the more I forget.  For awhile I was letting the internet remember my passwords for certain accounts on my home computer…until one day I had to login on another computer and I had NO IDEA what my main email password was.  You know the one I check every day.  Yeah, I just forgot it.  So I now force myself to login to every account I have, even if it means logging in to it several times a day. 

I don’t know what the point is other than I think I am going crazy.  Seriously, I am losing my mind and becoming so forgetful.  We have become so reliant on making things “easier” for ourselves that it actually, in my opinion, has become harder.  We are forgetting the basic things and I think our minds are just going 100 miles an hour because we are just too stimulated by all this stuff to remember.

So right here right now, I am saying that I am going to make a conscious effort to actually LEARN my sisters & my parent’s cell phone numbers and actually dial their number the old fashioned way like I did on a rotary phone when I want to call them instead of just hitting a pre-programmed number and hitting send.  If that means forgetting other things, fine, but I just think there are some things that we shouldn’t allow technology make “easier” for us.