The Benefits of Forgetting

Back in my college days before I could afford an apartment in the city, I rode the L.I.R.R. into Manhattan with an army of businessmen off to make a buck, their faces buried in the Wall Street Journal's stock market news. Despite being flat broke and thus without a horse in that race, as a burgeoning newspaper designer I loved looking at it for its austere and no-nonsense approach to what was certainly very important information. For many years the paper contained no photographs, just pen and ink drawings of columnists punctuating the long rows of type separated by black rule lines. It gave me the impression that somewhere there existed a sober tribe of grown-ups in charge of the world's finances. I slept more peacefully knowing they were out there.

No more. Above the banner on today's front page of that same paper are color photographs of two celebrities--an actress who seems to be naked except for her dangling earrings and a basketball player in sunglasses--separated by the headline, "Why Twitter and Facebook are Starstruck," printed in a casual and fun typeface. Lower down on the page, a large color photograph shows the president putting the Presidential Medal of Freedom around the neck of folksinger Bob Dylan, now 71. Inside, in the section called "Personal Journal," it is suggested in a huge headline worthy of a declaration of war to "Drop the 'G' in Chilling," a hint to the contents of an article about "How Slang Teachers Help Students Talk the Talk."

As the saying goes, every cloud has a silver lining, and this may actually be one for Alzheimer's: Loss of memory of a time when life was more serious, less concerned with superficial fluff and celebrity gossip, less downright ridiculous--a time when you called your doctor's office and a nurse answered, when the Medal of Freedom went to people like Mother Teresa and twittering was something that birds did--long before Rupert Murdoch bought the Wall Street Journal--might just be the ticket to having a nice day.