so, i'm curious if any other parents have experienced anything remotely resembling what I am about to describe herein:
since becoming a father, perhaps even during the pregnancy/build-up, I began developing a sixth sense I have only recently realized. This sixth sense is a sort of locality-based flash-scan photographic memory for physical objects... I hope that was lucid enuf to grasp, dear audience (familiarize yersef wit me dear ol' matey Heisenberg and his most glorious of princip'oes). But seriously, especially in my own home I can tell you where virtually every object in the house is located, down to a matter of inches or, if I cannot describe it's exact physical location I can walk almost directly to it and unearth it, even buried under fifteen days worth of accumulated clutter. I am actively training myself in other locales as well. For instance, I can walk into a place I have never been before, look at the general layout of the room and either memorize or surmise (probably a mix) the placement of every visible object in the joint. Crazy huh? Of course I have to attribute this newly discovered skill to fatherhood, what else could explain such a dramatic shift in perceptive powers? What else could define a mind turned inwards and outwards too much at the same time? What else could we assume about ourselves, learn from ourselves, if we acknowledged the simple fact that our minds are capable of so much more than we will ever know? Interesting to perceive in action are the inner workings of the stressed out human consciousness growing beyond its own means, motives, ends and justifications.
8 comments:
No such luck! Aside from seeming to know where P puts her glasses down, I can't find sweet f**k all around my house.
Me neither.
I always know where the baby is though.
hmmm... well bummer for you guys I guess but I'm glad you know where your baby is Raj! sometimes lyli and scarleht wander off in our yard and I lose 'em for a couple minutes. That's the good thing about screaming, it's pretty easy to follow.
The knowledge of a parent seems to come out of nowhere. It is instant in its ability to see around every corner before your child even steps a foot near that corner. Whether it be the famous words "having eyes in the back of your head" or the simple memory we all share of our mom yelling to us from the living room to but the milk back in the fridge. I'm not sure why it happens, or how it happens but it happens. As parents we developed the ultimate gift of memory.
Still to this day I can tell everything you could want to know about any home, office, store, and car I've stepped foot in since my daughters were born.
Welcome to parenthood, it only gets stranger from here.
-Libby
Our bodies are light...we are immortal.
Kudos on tapping this inner potential. As per my encounters with neuroscience, a general phenomena of our cognition is the increasingly automated nature of conscious/unconscious communication. As you well know, the conscious mind can be quite limited in its awareness. However, the unconscious contains every detail of every experience we have ever encountered. I guess it would be analogous to our own personal Akashic recording system. Interestingly enough, this mystical infinite storage concept was developed by the Akasha, a sanskrit word meaning "Sky." So, how are you doing Sky? Long time no bullshitting. Drop me a line. And for any needed clarification, this is "roy" or "Tarvis" or "Travis Fagala" or "the asshole who took you paintballing that afternoon the Gods tried to smote your vision."
-Travis
I had a similar sixth sense when I worked in a bookstore. After a few months, I could just tell where books were even if I hadn't seen the book for a few weeks. It was weird then, so i can empathize with what you got now.
I'm still too new to fatherhood to feel like I have it for our house. I think stuff is still moving around from room to room faster than I can track. We're trying now to declutter and give away as much as possible. My wife hit on a clean living kick at the same time I bought into stark minimalism, so hopefully we can get to bare essentials before everything turns into plastic crap.
Do you scare yourself not knowing the limit of the capabilities of your own mind? Because I don't know if you've done too many drugs or are just really smart (or a little of both) but your quandaries and discoveries are quite amusing to me. Keep it up. I look forward to something more than the average day to stimulate my mind. ;)
Also, your ability to catalogue a room would have to been derived from two things. First, you already have a grasp of spatial placement. Second, being a parent has caused you to constantly wonder where your kids are, always worrying about what they're getting into, etc. This has carried over into being able to place just about everything in a room, because you just HAVE to know the whereabouts and the contents therein.
Cheers,
madhatter
the ability to remember where objects are placed is well recognized among moms. I've never noticed it in father or man before, at least not to the same degree. hurray for you, you super aware pirate papa. anyway, in women is can be explained biologically. many women experience "placenta brain" while pregnant, and seem to be really forgetful. but it seems that really the energy is just directed into different areas. Scientists have witnessed the neuropathways in the brains of pregnant women growing significantly.
I would encourage friends and readers of your site to ask a lot of papas if they experience something similar, and as of yet, unexplained phenomena.
Love Ya,
AA
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