Admit it: you have a list of things you like, and things you don’t like, thank you very much. “I love murder mysteries!” you might proclaim with confidence—with just as much surety as “don’t even let cilantro touch my plate.” You’ve been around the block by your age, and you know what makes you tick… and what ticks you off.

But what if you forgot what you liked and didn’t like? What if your memory was mysteriously reset, and you got to start this little game of likes and dislikes over? Would you still gravitate towards Agatha Christie novels and shun cilantro on your tacos? Or might you voraciously consume romance novels and decide you actually don’t really care for tacos after all (hold up: let us never talk trash about tacos).

My 87-year-old dad is experiencing dementia—and it’s way less fun than everyone promised it would be! Watching someone you care about forget pretty much all the short-term stuff and even a lot of the long-term stuff you thought was locked in his memory banks forever—well, it’s disconcerting. Except when it’s fascinating.

My dad is forgetting what he doesn’t like, and it’s opening up a host of new opportunities.

In our daily phone repartee consisting of scintillating nuggets like the quality and quantity of his bathroom visits and “whatdja have for breakfast?”, this came up one day last week: “scrambled eggs, a pancake, bacon, orange slices, and coffee.” Sure, great, fine. EXCEPT THIS GIRL’S DAD DOES NOT DO ORANGES. He can kill a gallon of OJ but would (*gasp!*) never put an orange up to his mouth. Now he’s eating oranges and enjoying them. Several days in a row. He forgot how much he hated them and now, unclouded by the rules he set forth for himself about This Is What I Like and This Is What I Detest, he’s enjoying citrus like most orange juice lovers do. I didn’t say a word.

Yogurt arrived on my dad’s breakfast tray one morning while I was visiting him and THIS GIRL’S DAD DOES NOT DO YOGURT. I acted swiftly; I peeled the top off, handed it to him, and casually mentioned how lucky he was to get vanilla pudding for breakfast. My dad likes yogurt now. I didn’t say a word.

My dad ordered butter chicken curry off his assisted living center’s dinner menu last week. THIS GIRL’S DAD… okay, okay, you get it. Look who likes foods with spices other than salt and pepper now? I didn’t say a word.

I have other dad-dementia examples, but let’s keep this a little less geriatric here on out.

Think of something you don’t like. Examples might include:

The bistro downtown where you had that underwhelming chicken salad sandwich
Agnes, who volunteers at the community center
Panna cotta
Cruises
Getting up early
Documentaries
Dark rum
Children
Hiking on any terrain with an incline
Horror movies
I could keep going but won’t; we’ve all got somewhere to be

Perhaps you’ve become a bit rigid over the years about your likes and dislikes?

I used to hate tequila (based on a rough night in Mexico—circa 1994—which we will never speak of again) (except it involved a lot of tequila and sushi and a really rough next morning), but I pressed the reset button when we moved to Palm Springs. I now love margaritas and palomas and want Eva Longoria to take me on a tour of her tequila factory, at which point we will become very close friends. I could’ve gone to my grave as a staunch tequila hater (because “I don’t like tequila”), and now I will go to my grave with cirrhosis of the liver happily licking a salt rim. With Eva sponsoring the beverage program at my funeral.

What’s one dislike you might want to pressure-test? Maybe you lodged the dislike in your psyche years ago, when it was well-warranted, and it’s now worth seeing if you’ve evolved? What if you forgot that you didn’t care too much for Agnes, for example. If you re-met her and were more open-minded, would you actually appreciate her snide humor? (It’s okay if you’d still not like her, just like it’s okay if you can’t fathom taking a cruise or watching slasher films. We’re not supposed to like everything.)

Might your life expand if you tried something new? If you gave something you didn’t like a second chance? If you tried the bistro and realized they made a mean Cobb salad? If you were willing to watch a documentary? If you tried that hike in Zion?

Satchel Paige once said, “How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?”… on a similar vein, “what would you like if you forgot you didn’t like it?”. A new, vitality-filled life might be waiting for you if you escaped your old “ohhhh, I don’t like that” narratives. Maybe you like church after all? Maybe you like crossword puzzles after all? Maybe you like spicy wings after all?

We might be able to teach an old dog new tricks after all… even (especially?) in the midst of dementia. Now go eat an orange.