Attention span and remembering

 I noticed two things today that gave me insights into myself and the society around me.
      1) I was checking my daughter into the doctor's office. Woa, yeah, it was on a tablet. We don't normally go to doctors. It wasn't for treatment. It was a sign off on a 'diagnosis' so they wouldn't change her class or up her to a full day. Anyhoo, it asked for my phone number. Looked it up. I hadn't memorized it because it's going to change soon anyways. I do have a photographic memory if I'm not disregarding something completely because it's not worth saving. If anyone asked me my phone number 5 minutes later, I'd have probably had it still in my short term memory. Instead, it was asked again on the tablet. I sensed the almost subconscious process: did I forget the answer and that's why they're asking it again? Law of attraction dictates I must then forget and so I did. A millisecond! My entire thought process was revealed to me. In questioning it, I instruct myself to forget it. So how often does this happen other than "I can't find my keys"? In the case of losing something, I've learned to just tell myself that it's here and will appear before my eyes when I'm not looking. Since then, nothing ever remains missing. There's got to be technique to stop myself from triggering my own forgetting what I had just written. Being asked the same question repeatedly doesn't mean we've answered wrong the first time. They just need a separate document for everything. I totally understand why my daughter flipped out and refused to continue to answer questions that were asked the day before by a special diagnostic teacher who visited. It wouldn't surprise me if the psychologists who aide the "powers that be" already know this and it's just another tool to keep us all on edge and self-questioning. It is not something that makes me happy; that someone would know me better than me without even ever having to meet me. This is MY path of self discovery. These are things for me to discover about me. If you know something, I want to know. Knowing and using it against me is a WHOLE 'nother story.
    2) When I was in the nursing home expected to die, my children had gone to public school for full days. I got them back, school ended and summer was upon us. I gathered a bunch of water toys, filled up buckets with water and headed down the stairs of our apartment. My daughter exclaims; "A water activity!". "No, baby girl, we're going outside to play".
     A friend asked today how dinner Saturday went. It went fast. It occurred to me: the woman in charge said it usually only lasts 45 minutes. 45 minutes to eat and socialize? Shoot. My friends and I get together and we forget time. There is no limit. Conversation flows and before we realize it, it's the wee hours of the morning. 45 minutes was allotted for an activity. Just like school days are structured. homeroom, 30-45 minute class, 30-45 minute class, lunch, recess, after school activity time allotment, dinner time allotment, ready for bed allotment, sleep allotment. Time is scheduled, allotted, structured for EVERYTHING. When we don't have an activity scheduled and allotted followed by another; we get ansy, we get anxious, we feel like we are in the wrong place, we feel like we're forgetting something. Attention spans become habits of time allotment, just like they're conditioned to switch within 45 minutes to another environment and associated activity. When nothing is scheduled, the smell of another environment and associated activity is missing. Our entire future depends upon these scheduled allotments: don't do well, you won't get into college, you'l be poor and homeless, an unproductive citizen and member of the community. Absence of activity = kicked out of the community! It's all subconscious. It's what has us waking up at the same time every day even if we don't have an alarm to go off. We've traded natural cycles for scheduled activity time allotment.
   So, yeah, just two more ways school fucks with our heads and makes us sick. Appreciate the insights it's giving me. Glad it's temporary.