Sounds like we’d get along. I like to say I’m fascinated by everything, except sports and celebrities. (Though I do have a fondness for certain voice actors in US animation, simply by consuming so much of the medium.) As to fashion, modern fashion isn’t interesting, but historical fashion is pretty cool. I didn’t think I’d be into historical architecture until I inadvertently took a class that included it in high school.

That’s also possible. I like your phrasing much better.

Every time school gave me an essay or project about “Where do you see yourself in X amount of years?” I’d freeze. How on earth am I supposed to know that?! I don’t know where I’ll be next week, or next year, I can’t know where I’d be in 10, 20, or whatever arbitrary number they assigned.

I never completed one of those assignments. My brain just couldn’t comprehend it. The future is a vast open space that I’m constantly stepping toward. I can’t see what’s there. Planning for long-term has always caused me problems. I couldn’t decide on a major for college and didn’t end up going until I was 22 (and I dropped out a couple years later.)

I absolutely, 100% agree with the “nearsightedness of the future” assessment. I’m just strolling through life, living with what comes. I recently signed a 12 month lease, and that’s the farthest I’ve planned ahead in a really long time.

I thought this was about to go a very different way at the beginning.

If you’re a more visual person (or have a visual imagination), I find that remembering the context helps recall. Like, where I am, who I’m with, what I was doing, etc.

There’s also classic mnemonics, like acronyms, but done visually. Sometimes I imagine a scene that can immediately recall the thing I want to remember. It’s hard to describe in words, but then again sometimes the thoughts I want to remember aren’t necessarily in “words” anyway.

I have a notebook in my car, specifically for writing down things when I’m out driving somewhere.

Sometimes I spend so long trying to find it under all the rest of the crap in my car, that when I finally get down to writing, I’m lucky if I can recall the thought at all.

… and if we don’t get a dopamine hit from exercise?