A Slight Case of Alzheimer's...

One of the things that I still pride myself with is my memory. As time goes by, certain things slow down a tad, but my memory has never let me down....................until today! The story goes something like this....

In or around 1967, I dated a girl named Sheila Kosmeirski. Sheila was a girl of Polish descent, but was as lightning quick mentally and pretty easy to look at too. We dated for around 3 or 4 months and I really don't remember how we parted, but we did remain friends. One night in 1968, while out with my fiance' who later became my first wife, we bumped into Sheila at some night spot in Chicago, where we lived. We were already engaged when we ran into Sheila and my soon to be wife and Sheila really hit it off and my fiance' suggested that Sheila attend our wedding. With that "Holy Crap" look still on my face, I wholeheartedly agreed that it would be a GREAT idea! In my mind I was really thinking, wtf?

As time went by, we shot off an invitation to Sheila and low and behold, she actually attended, sans a date. The presence of Sheila went pretty unnoticed and we moved on with our life and eventually moved here to AZ in 1974, along with our 2 sons, ages 2 and 6 yrs.

One Saturday, my wife sent me to the grocery store for a few items and while browsing the isles completely lost, I happened past a woman that was deciding between Sugar Pops and Cocoa Puffs in the cereal isle. Suddenly, I stopped dead in my tracks, when I realize who this woman was, 1800 miles from where I expected her to be. It was Sheila! Neither of us knew what to say and we both explained how we wound up in a place called Arizona. Sheila lived with her new husband, a little guy that we soon met. We exchanged phone numbers and promised to call one another and get together with our respective spouses.

A few days later, we got together to go out for dinner and we met Tony, her husband. He was kind of a loud mouth type and my wife and I decided we didn't need to get too close with the new couple, in spite of the fact that we both liked Sheila. Years passed, about 30 of them and who do you suppose is involved in the class reunion that's taking place right here in AZ next month? Right, Sheila (formerly) Kosmeirski. Only we're both now divorced...

We start exchanging jokes online and occasional comments to one another. I like to write sometimes and Sheila edits writer's works for a living. She occasionally reads my blog and shares her thoughts with me, online... Today, we exchanged some emails and this is a portion of our exchange:

Me: Question, did you move to Scottsdale from Glendale? And yes I'll be your friend, actually I thought I always was??? I even invited you to my wedding, lol.. How the hell did that happen?
Dancing, not country and not so much. My heart surgery in 05 left me with compromised stamina for long periods of dancing. I tried dancing and it required a lot of breaks between songs, to breathe!
I'm leaving for Florida on Monday, but when I return, perhaps we can talk?

Sheila: So, I don't live in Scottsdale and I have not moved from where I am. I've been here since 1983 and wish I could get the hell out - back to Davenport, IA. For the record - I take everything for face value and now I realize that the story about us in the Alpha Beta over sugar pops is just a fantasy for fun! See, I am so gullible - aren't I. That's from being an Aries. Call me before you go to Florida - I want to argue with you.

Right around this time I was suspecting something was wrong. Why is it that she doesn't remember bumping into me in the Alpha Beta at Tatum and Cactus? I called her!

Not only did she not recall going to my wedding, but she never lived in Scottsdale with Tony. Then I started thinking, "Well, it's finally going"! My mind had let me down. I remember things that were actually a different way than I recall. I wondered if I was getting Alzheimer's. By this time, I was hardly listening to anything she was saying... I asked her if she had to wear a back brace after breaking her back in her sophomore year and she said, no she never injured her back. Things just weren't making sense to me, duh!

While still trying to make sense out of my memory completely letting me down, I heard her say, almost though a fog, "Maybe you're thinking of the other Sheila Kosmeirski that went to school with us! WHAT, that's right! There WAS another girl with exactly the same name as my Sheila and that's who I was talking to on the phone and by the way, we talked for 2 full hours. That's when I realized that the reason that I stopped dating the first Sheila was because she was kind of dull. This Sheila had a GREAT personality and was full of life and according to the photo that she sent me, fared pretty well over the years. Actually she looked pretty damned HOT!

You can probably imagine what I'm thinking. I didn't do so well with the first Sheila Kosmeirski, romantically and now I get to try a "DO OVER"!