Orange Elephants

The other day Dylan, my older son was talking to Sean, my seven year old son about the use of word association to remember important things.  In trying to explain it,  he said, " I was having this same conversation with Mom the other day.  Do you remember that Mom?"  He directed the question to me.

I looked at him blankly.  No,  I didn't remember at all.  In fact I had no idea what he was talking about.  He got a little frustrated.  " Don't you remember? You HAVE to remember!  We had a whole conversation about it and you were sitting on the couch and I was sitting on the chair."   No.  I didn't remember at all.  I was pretty sure that it was someone else he had been talking to and it was HIM who had forgotten.  

Then that night I was laying in bed and suddenly it hit me.  But not everything.  Only a little smidgen of the conversation and it being about word association to help aid your memory.  I laid there for the longest time trying to remember the full conversation but couldn't.  It just wouldn't surface in my mind.  It was as if it was right there, but just got caught in amidst all the other thoughts jumbled in my head.

The next day when I saw Dylan,  I exclaimed,  " Dylan I DO remember the conversation.  Part of it.  It was a color.  I think it was blue.  Something to do with blue monkeys maybe???"

Dylan shook his head and chuckled, " No,  it wasn't blue monkeys.  It was orange elephants!"  

Suddenly it clicked!!  It was!! It was orange elephants.  When I thought of orange elephants it was supposed to make me remember what I was supposed to remember!! 

" But what was I supposed to remember when I thought of orange elephants?" I asked Dylan.

" I have no idea" he said, " that was for YOUR memory; YOUR word association, not mine."

So now, I am wandering around, wracking my brain, trying to remember what orange elephants was supposed to be helping me remember.  And I think it was mildly important.

Did I invite someone over?
Was it someone's name?
Was it to remember a password?
Was it to remember an invitation?
More importantly,  did I already miss it or forget it or misplace it?

All I have running around in my brain is orange elephants and nothing else - it's blank, completely totally a blank.   And it is honestly driving me wildly crazy.

I may be wrong but, I think that the word association trick is not a good fit for me.  Haha.