Stephen Vasciannie IN HIS wonderful book, Grist for the Mills: Reflection on a Life, Gladstone Mills notes, in passing, what we all realise as we move beyond age 40 or so. He takes a retrospective view of a period in Jamaican history of over 50 years, and from the outset, he points out the mysteries of long-term recall.
So, Mills writes, "As we grow older, recent events and incidents seem to recede from the memory, while some from the distant past remain almost intact. In explanation, we are told that the mental tape was fresher then; hence a better quality and a more durable recording."
The truth of this observation walks with us almost every day; but for me, the massive power cuts experienced in New York, Toronto and in other parts of North America, last Thursday, brought home the point with unquestionable clarity. Short-term memory: how many people are now certain that the power cuts took place on Thursday, and not Wednesday, or Friday?
Long-term memory: I went to my library, took out my copy of Page One: Major Events as Presented in the New York Times, turned to page 226, where I saw the headline "Power Failure Snarls Northeast; 800,000 Are Caught in Subways Here; Autos Tied Up, City Gropes in Dark; Snarl at Rush Hour Spreads into 9 States".
This, then, was the lead story in the New York Times on Wednesday, November 10, 1965. The first line of the story indicated that "the largest power failure in history blacked out nearly all of New York City, parts of nine Northeastern States and two provinces of southeastern Canada last night." That power cut which lasted for at least three hours in most places covered an area of over 80,000 square miles and affected over 25 million people. The power cut story completely overshadows President Johnson's attempt to restate America's goals in the Vietnam War, issued on the morning of the blackouts.
LONG-TERM MEMORY
Long-term memory: I cannot tell you why I knew the power cut story was at page 226 of my New York Times book, but that at some stage over 10 years ago, I read it. And, going further back, I cannot say why I remember Mrs. Glaze, our school teacher at Hurlingham Prep School, telling us about this power failure in New York; it was, after all, over 37 years ago.
But there, in my mind's eye, is Mrs. Glaze, standing before the group of five and six-year-old children, talking about how thousands of people were stranded in trains that normally run under the earth. Our class is at the side of her home, it's covered by a large aluminium panel, the main wall is painted black along the lower half and pink higher up, some of us sit in benches made for two, while others sit on separate desks. Mrs. Glaze wears black-rimmed glasses, which she takes off from time to time for emphasis. Robert Wright, Richard Dyche, Steven Hylton and Kim Mullings are among the students under the large aluminium panel.
I cannot recall how we reacted to the information about suffering Americans in the subway many years ago; nor can I suggest that we, the children, recognised that some of those stranded by the power failure could well have been our own aunts and uncles, cousins and even mothers and fathers. But, perhaps, in some unrecognisable ways, that episode could well have influenced some of our attitudes.
Power cuts were, of course, to become a regular part of life in Jamaica in the early 1970s. And again, I cannot tell you why I remember it, but, in the midst of a Physics class in 1975, the teacher talked about electricity, and made a passing remark to the effect that power cuts were much less frequent in the mid-1970s than earlier on. Immediately, the politically sensitive decided that the teacher was a comrade in his heart, for he made an observation complimentary to engineers under the first Manley Government. This may well have been an incorrect conclusion, and God knows why I should remember this; it's almost like a basketball shot from downtown. Long-term memory.
HURLINGHAM PREP
But the evocative power cut of 1965 also generated its own share of speculation. Did it not prompt at least the title of the movie Where Were You When The Lights Went Out? And, was it ever really established that the population of Northeastern USA grew by a distinctly greater rate than normal in the nine months following the imposition of darkness? This time round, too, we can expect talk concerning the demographic significance of ConEd and its companions. This will certainly not match the Mandingo debate in Jamaica, but it will help to stimulate our impulse for titillation.
And, back to Hurlingham Prep. Mrs. Glaze kept us on a strict regime: following current affairs, we went on to Mathematics. We would line up outside on her driveway, next to her khaki green Cortina stationwagon, and recite our "times table". Long-term memory: the 9 times table was always tricky, and many of us stumbled over the value of 11 x 12.
But, you know, we learnt the tables off by heart, because we had no choice. It meant, though, that by age seven or eight, many students were ready to tackle problems of Arithmetic that now appear to be brain-teasers in the GSAT Examination. There is a message in this, and it's not too far below the surface.
Stephen Vasciannie is Professor of International Law and Head of the Department of Government at the University of the West Indies, Mona, and consultant in the Attorney-General's chambers.
