John Butlerjuggles with numbers and memory
As far as I can recall, the first password I ever had to memorise was 3343. This was the code for the combination of my bicycle lock, and it could not be changed. It was only four numbers, but I wrote it down for safe keeping, and I managed never to forget it.
I was reminded of those days last week when I stood at an ATM and entered those four numbers: 3.3.4.3. After a pause, the ATM informed me that I had entered the wrong Pin. These numbers were so deeply embedded in my cerebellum as to be non-negotiable, so I entered them once more. It declined the code again and asked me to try my luck a third time. Cursing the machine, I entered the damn numbers, then watched helplessly as it digested my card and gloated that I would now have to contact my branch to retrieve it.
There are simply too many passwords to remember these days, and I know, because, sitting on the steps outside the bank the following morning, I counted them. Two ATM Pins and two credit-card Pins makes four. My online-banking password and Pin makes six. The password for my mobile phone and my voicemail password makes eight. My top-up code, frequent-flyer code and three e-mail accounts makes 13. Add to them the code for my house alarm and the code for the front gate, and 15 passwords will get me through an average day, without buying anything online using Amazon, eBay, PayPal or Moneyteller.
I am aware that a certain amount of consolidation would reduce this number to a smaller, more manageable clutch of super-passwords, but I have resisted this move. It takes too much time, and if it can't be one password it may as well be 14 - and it turns out it can't be just one password anyway. Every time you're asked to create a password, a different style of password is required to the last one. The last one was made up of any four numbers? Now it's a minimum of six. The last time it was just numbers? Sorry, now we're looking for a combination of numbers and letters. Last time you were allowed to use numbers? Sorry, we're all about the letters this time. Just letters.
This slew of symbols demands the mental recall of a man who could complete a Rubik's cube in less than a minute. I was never able to finish two sides of the Rubik's cube, and this puzzle contains another complex dimension. User names. Take my name; you will agree that a solid yet sweetly lyrical quality makes it a most desirable name the world over. When you add to that the sheer number of parents looking to name their child after me these days, the scale of the problem I have to contend with when it comes to picking a user name becomes clear. I can never use my own name as my user name, because one of the other 10 million John Butlers will have beaten me to the punch.
I have to resort to the names of obscure footballers, prog-rock bands and, in one case, my favourite type of cheese, to access my information, my money, my house and my bicycle on a day-to-day basis, and I have a rickety system for remembering the right codes at the right time, a system that is by no means foolproof, as I recently learnt at the ATM.
I find it ironic that, in addition to passwords, sometimes you have to give your mother's maiden name to prove you are who you say you are. I consider this ironic because my mother taught me how to remember things in the first place. I know this doesn't qualify as an instance of irony, because it's quite common for mothers to teach their children. However, isn't it ironic that I am able to remember exactly when it was and where it was that I first learned how to remember, how to really remember?
We were in the kitchen. She was at the counter, peeling potatoes, and I sat at the table. I was having trouble with my multiplication tables. They were simply not going in, and I had one particular bogey number, one number that eluded the reach and grasp of memory. I can still hear the whirr of the washer-dryer in the corner of the room, my mind spinning in tandem with it as I searched in vain for this, the answer to the question of all questions.
"Seven eights, John?"
I can still see the dancing socks behind the foggy glass. The whirr and rattle of the machine.
" Seven eights?"
People say you never forget how to ride a bicycle, but that accords the ceremony of pushing pedals some magical psychic quality, whereas the truth is far simpler. You never forget how to ride a bicycle because you learn it so well. You never forget because you learn it over and over. You learn it when you are young, and every time you climb on to the saddle you learn it once again.
I answered, and Mum asked me again.
"Seven eights, John?"
I answered, and she asked me again. I answered and again she asked me, and again I answered back. This continued until the asking, the answering and the accompanying washing machine became a kind of crazy song, a tribal chant of ours.
"Seven eights?"
I never forget again. Some 15 years later and I am on the phone, calling from San Francisco to say hello and happy birthday.
"Seven eights, John?" This is much more than a number now. In the years between, it became our secret password, our way of saying how well I know you. And what age was she?
"Fifty-six, Mum. Happy birthday."
John Butler blogs at http://lozenge.wordpress.com