Still Alice

Alice is looking forward to the first snow of the season as she and John walk to Eric Wellman’s annual holiday party for Harvard’s psychology department. Nothing very “extraordinary” happens at these parties, but Alice loves going to them because the people there all feel like family. Not only are they close in their personal lives, but they share a common ambition: “to understand the mind, the know the mechanisms driving human behavior and language, emotion and appetite.” It can be a stressful and “strange” life, but “they were in it together.”

At the party, Alice grabs a cream puff and goes in search of John. As soon as she finds him, Dan comes in with his new wife, Beth, who is wearing a bright red dress. Alice says she’ll have another glass of wine even though the one in her hand is still half-full. Alice excuses herself to go to the bathroom, finishing her wine on the way. Before going back to John, Alice stops in the kitchen to listen to the wives talk and get another glass of wine.

Alice finds John having a conversation with Eric, Dan, and a woman in a red dress. When the conversation between John and the others comes to a pause, Alice introduces herself to the woman in the red dress. The woman looks at Dan before nervously answering that she’s Beth. Alice doesn’t recognize her and asks Beth if she’s a new postdoc fellow. Beth tells Alice that she is Dan’s wife and Alice congratulates her and tells her how nice it is to “finally meet” her. Nobody replies to this, but Alice notices Eric looking from her wine glass to John. John tells Alice they should leave, leading her to the door. Alice means to ask what happened but forgets when she sees that it’s snowing.

Three days before Christmas, Alice goes to the Memory Disorders Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital to see Dr. Davis, a neurologist. Alice explains her memory problems to Dr. Davis, who asks her how long she’s been having these issues and advises her to bring a family member with her in future because her memory problems might prevent her from being a “reliable source” of what’s happening. Embarrassed, Alice agrees to bring someone with her next time.

Dr. Davis asks Alice many of the same questions about her lifestyle, eating habits, sleeping habits, and mood that Dr. Moyer asked. Dr. Davis then asks questions about her family history and Alice tells him about the premature deaths of her mother and sister and her father’s more recent death due to liver failure as a result of his lifelong alcoholism. Alice only has “limited knowledge” of her extended family’s history.

Dr. Davis tells Alice that he is going to give her an address to remember. After that they will “do some other things” and he is going to ask her the address again. The address he gives her is “John Black, 42 West Street, Brighton.” Dr. Davis then asks Alice to answer some simple questions about her age, the date, the season, where they are, the time of day, and gives her some simple cognitive tasks, and Alice is able to do them without trouble. When Dr. Davis asks her to repeat the address, however, she is only able to remember “John Black” and “Brighton.” Dr. Davis gives her some options to fill in the rest of the information, but he does not tell her if she guesses right or not.

Dr. Davis tells Alice that he has the results of her recent bloodwork and MRI, but he wants her to get some additional bloodwork and a lumbar puncture before coming back in a month. At her next appointment, she will have “neuropsychological testing” beforehand. Alice asks him if he thinks her problem is “just normal forgetting” and he tells her he doesn’t think it is and wants to “investigate it further.” Alice suspects that Dr. Davis knows what is wrong but doesn’t want to tell her.

On the morning of Christmas Eve Alice looks through family photo albums. She hasn’t labeled any of the pictures when she put them in, but that doesn’t matter because Alice’s “diligence” and strong mind is able to recall who is in the pictures, when they were taken, where, and what was going on that day. As she looks through her children’s childhood photos of vacations and dance recitals, the photos “prompted other, unphotographed memories from that day.” John, however, struggles to do the same.

Alice brings up Lydia’s acting classes and tells John she wants to talk to him about paying for them “behind [her] back.” John apologizes and tells her she’s right, but that he disagrees that he shouldn’t pay for it at all because they paid for their other two children to go to college. Alice tells John this is different because Lydia is not going to college, and Alice worries that not going to college will hold Lydia back. The conversation ends when John realizes he has to get to work before going to get Lydia from the airport. Before leaving, John tells Alice that Lydia is “going to be fine,” but she doesn’t answer. They have had this conversation before and have never reached an understanding. John keeps “his status as the favorite parent” while Alice remains the strict one.

Alice becomes more “relaxed” in John’s absence and looks back through the photo albums, which gives her “a renewed and reassuring confidence in the strength of her memory.” However, she also knows that these pictures and the memories related to them are stored in her long-term memory, not the short-term memory with which she is struggling. Without the ability to retain short-term memories, Alice knows she will not be able to create new long-term ones.

Alice hears the mail get dropped into the slot and gets an idea. She looks at each piece of mail (a holiday greeting card, an ad from a gym, phone and gas bills, and an L.L. Bean catalog) and then sets it down. She waits five minutes and then repeats to herself what each item is. She successfully remembers each item, but then realizes that the experiment in the doctor’s office took longer and she needs is an “extended delay interval.”

Alice grabs her dictionary to pick a random word and lands on “berserk.” Alice sets a timer and starts making the holiday dinner. The timer goes off and Alice correctly remembers the word. Alice continues “playing this game,” increasing the number of words to remember and the time between picking and remembering them. The added difficulty does not prevent her from remaining “error-free.”

Anna, Charlie, Tom, and John are in the living room and Lydia is talking to Alice about her acting classes. Even though Alice doesn’t like Lydia taking these classes, she does not interrupt because she is so focused on making dinner and remembering her next round of words. But as Lydia continues to talk, Alice finds she can’t “resist being interested” in what she has to say.

Alice’s timer to remember the words goes off, but instead of reciting the words she opens the oven and looks at the roast, which is obviously still undercooked. Suddenly, she realizes the timer was to tell her to remember her words, but she can’t remember all of them. Lydia is still talking, and Anna calls in to ask Alice where the wine opener is. Alice tries to ignore the noise to remember the word, but to no avail. Lydia is still talking, so Alice snaps at her and tells her she doesn’t want to hear about it. Lydia, “obviously hurt” turns away and then goes to help Anna. Once Lydia leaves, Alice remembers the words.

Alice grabs the ingredients for the white chocolate bread pudding she makes every Christmas Eve. When she grabs the eggs, she becomes confused: there are a dozen, but she doesn’t think the recipe calls for a dozen eggs and no longer has her mother’s handwritten recipe card for it. Furthermore, Alice “hadn’t needed to refer to it in years” because she’s been making it since she was a child. Still, Alice cannot remember how many eggs she’s supposed to use. Instead, she turns to the other ingredients, but doesn’t know where to start. Frustrated, Alice starts throwing the eggs into the sink.

Alice turns to see a confused Lydia in the doorway. Lydia asks her what she’s doing and Alice tells her that the eggs were expired and there won’t be any bread pudding. Lydia tells her she will go to the store for eggs and make the pudding herself, and that Alice should go sit down with everyone else. Alice goes into the living room still “shaking,” but no longer overcome by anger. Before she leaves, Lydia looks into the room and asks Alice how many eggs she needs.