When I was a kid (like 50 or so years ago? Ouch!), I remember I’d ask my Daddy where he was going if he appeared to be loading up or packing up or gathering up to go somewhere. I remember how he would tease me by quipping “To Kalamazoo and Timbuctu!” 
Since I’m bound for Kalamazoo tomorrow morning, I had called Mama and Daddy last night to let them know that at long last, after fifty-five years of life on earth, Timbuctu may still have to wait a while longer, but at last, Kalamazoo is on the itinerary. I reminded Daddy how I remembered his using that little expression in those days.
But then came a bonus: Daddy helped me remember another detail about Kalamazoo that I had forgotten from that time when I must have been four or five years old. And I was a little amazed and at the same time a little touched, because he remembered the following particulars: When he would tell me “Kalamazoo and Timbuctu,” I would argue with him that there was no such place and that he was just making that up, and we’d have this silly argument–all good natured, of course.
Why did he remember that? Why didn’t I remember that? But after he related the story, I DID remember the exchange. Maybe I’m making more out of an innocent sentimentality than I should, but I just thought it was kind of neat that the 85 year old great-grandparent whose mental sharpness is dulled by the years still remembers the details of a little boy’s childish incredulity more 50 or so years ago.
And don’t you know, that after all these years, turns out he was right and I was wrong about the existence of Kalamazoo.
