As I was driving home this afternoon, they were talking on the radio about the very first memory you remember. I didn't need to think long: I still remember me, as a toddler, standing sideways against the grey wall and under a brown windowsill. Looking at my mother while she was walking away towards the door to go to work after dropping me off at school. Crying my heart out, lots of tears and a breaking feeling inside. This makes me remember how much I loved my mother and totally leaned on her. And in generally how important mothers are for their children. Well, curious as I am , please, tell me your first (or oldest - what's in a name??) memory?
I have a few and they are funny favourites of mine. My brother was born when I was 4 1/2 years old and I remember going into the freshly painted little room that was the new nursery and putting little J's on the wall and rocking chair, all of which used to be mine. The funny thing is my parents made a big deal and redid the bigger room that I was moving into but I guess I wanted to still own my old room as well. My great granny's house, it was the old vicarage and she had huge gardens that I would play in and her little dog named Badger. I remember getting lost in the house and sitting on the stairs crying not realizing that I had gone up the wrong set. Being an old house there were servants stairs and those were the ones I decided to use. Going into my great-granny's kitchen and her making me an orange drink that was fizzy and riding on the antique rocking horse she had refinished (used real horse hair) in front of the china cabinet. I was five.
I was less than five when this happened but I couldn't say how less. My mom had a friend named Del. Del had a little boy a bit older than my older brother, but she really wanted a little girl and she used to ask my mother if she could watch me sometimes so have a little girl for a bit (I guess no one told her what I tom boy I was.. ) Anyway, Del was always very nice and kind to me, one day we made a cake together and made gobs of icing to cover the lopsided mess it was. I remember her telling me I could lick the beaters or the bowl but I had to save one or the other for Jimmy her son. Well I promptly licked them both clean, and she just launched and laughed with me about how we would tell Jimmy we bought the cake... (it was so awful even Jimmy would never have believed it.. ) I also remember crawling under a car in my Easter Pinafore, to catch a mangy orange cat who was bigger than me. I dragged it home to my mother and told her it was lost so we needed to keep it. She practically had apoplexy over my dress, but I can't remember what happened to the cat. When I was five we moved and they finally got me a kitten so I wouldn't have to steal them anymore...
I remember being in the hospital (no not at birth) just older than 2 1/2. I was there to get my tonsils out. I remember the boy in the crib next to mine had both hands wrapped up with bandages. He had tried to play in an escalator. I was scared of escalators for most of my life and when I had boys of my own it was even harder. I made myself ride them and take the boys on them but I bet they heard that story about the little boy a million times.
I have several memories from when I was two, but I'm not sure which came first. They weren't traumatic or anything, just stuff like playing with toys and discovering songs that I liked.
I remember my dad giving me a ride in a wheelbarrow full of cut grass, then dumping me down a hill. I have no idea how old I was, but my mom told me I was about 2. I just love that memory now since my dad is gone.
Oh gosh, what a sweet and precious memories you have!!! I love each and every single one of them. And really, I am amazed some of you have memories from about the age of 2 or less... I would need to ask my mother how old I as. AS I was standing against the classroom I was in, she could recall it. Hmm, I am curious now, so will definitely do that.
Hmm... I can remember when I was about three years old sneaking out of my upstairs bedroom and sneaking down the hall and sitting at the top of the steps to listen to my parents talking together. I thought I was so sneaky, but looking back I'm sure my Mom knew I was there.
I don't recall how old I was (under 5yo), but I remember being at my grandparents house with all the family gathered around and my grandfather giving me (the eldest) a dollar to half with my sister. I promptly ripped it in half and handed her one half of the dollar. I didn't understand why everyone in the room was screaming with laughter. It's been a fun story to tell to my kids.
I love reading these! This is a more difficult exercise in remembering than I thought it would be. It's interesting because I feel like my present self and my most recent self have been in the business of remembering, kwim? I have been documenting and keeping memories in my adulthood so readily and easily that I figured I would sit to respond here and have some vivid First Memory to share. But really it's more like hazy images and emotions that I remember most when it comes to my earliest memories. I have this general remembrance of following after my sister around the house everywhere she went. She was 11 years older than I and I thought she was just the height of cool.
reading these is just amazing!!!!! I have many memories of me being a toddler, I had one operation every year from birth to 8 years old, as I couldnt walk- main memory is that they would plaster my leg from the toes all the away up to my waist band- In the leg they would stick little plastic toys so when it was time to cut the plaster open 3 months later, I would be looking forward to the toys.... Then I have this memory of when I was 5 , waking up from the operation and saying to my parents that I had dreamed my God Mother came to visit and my auntie Pauline, and that I had gotten as a present a talking dolll....and they said you didnt dream, you were under the anesthesia...and there was the doll!!!!! it was big and called Claudia and you pulled a cord on her neck and she said phrases my mum still has her, destroyed by my brother LOL but the biggest one was the day I walked. I was 5-
I remember a lot from when I was three (for some reason). That must have been a big year for me. I remember standing in pre-school, during some group activity, and wishing Captain Kirk (from Star Trek) would beam down and save me (from what, I don't know). I remember the feeling of cornmeal at the pre-school cornmeal table) and that we had a big clawfoot bathtub filled with pillows where we could sit and look at books. We also had a clay table with this little brass pump that held water for wetting the clay. I got a library card that year (and signed for it... my grandma was showing me off), but I remember standing in the library and seeing the dust particles floating in the sunshine from the windows near the ceiling (and the brightly-colored papers lining the walls where kids had documented books they read). I also remember hospital trips and having blood drawn (and being held down by several from the hospital staff) because they thought I had leukemia. To this day, I still remember the taste of the liquid iron I had to take on a daily basis for severe anemia. And I remember dancing with the neighbor boy in my grandma's rec room.
ohhh I didnt get into Captain Kirk after I watched all Next Generation, but I remember dreaming of Man of Uncle (or Man from UNCLE?) it was call El Agente de CIPOL not surprising you are such a good writer...love your describing, how vivid the memories are that I can "see them! now this, this is something I have a very very distinctive memory of: the blood tests, my crying, the priking the finger and sometimes the vein with huge serynges.... I had 9 operations from before a year olf until 8 years old, and every time it meant blood tests...my gradma would give us a record (music like 33rpm or 45 rpm record) remember very well getting, when I was 6 or 7 , an album that had California Dreaming by Mammas & the Pappas - but the iron thing? yuuuuck they gave me liver blended with rice and made me eat it..... I never EVER had liver again in my life.....
I loved reading all these memories, too. Precious each one, even the hard ones for they help form who we are.
