It is amazing what you can remember of when you are young. I’m not sure if it is just me or if it is like this for everyone but it seems totally random what we remember of when we were very little. It seems like major events should be what we remember most, and that is true for me to an extent. But my earliest memories or at least my earliest memory is not major. My first memory is fragmented. It is of my first home in Clare. It consists of me sitting under a walnut tree and then a little later being helped wash my hands in the laundry sink.
My next memory was of a major time, and is probably my clearest early memory. That memory is of being carried out of the women’s and children’s hospital by my mum after recovering from meningitis. I remember bawling my eyes out, the reason for which I can’t remember, but I can remember the bleary view of our car across the road, and my dad coming to meet us.
My next clear memory is the one which got me thinking about the triviality of our earliest memories. The memory is of one of my days at kindy. It’s probably the earliest memory which is as clear as later happenings. That is, it is as clear as my high school memories, or any event which occurred a year or more ago. This memory is less corrupted by my mature brain filling in details which I couldn’t remember than the two I’ve previously mentioned.
And the memory is of being highly sceptical of someone I met telling me that they knew how to perform karate. I remember clearly the demonstration, and though I didn’t tell them, I knew they were just swinging their arms around, and that Karate took years of practice.
That’s it. That is my earliest total memory. How trivial is that! I’ve been told about any number of major events that happened about that time in my life and the one I remember is some kid lying to me about his karate skills?!
The human brain is a perplexing thing.
