Incidents of Childhood

I probably have more memories of Daughter's childhood than she does.

She remembered the blizzard for years, even though she wasn't near her third birthday yet. But at around age six, the memory faded.

I noticed a lot of her baby/toddler memory bit the dust as soon as she got all busy with readin and writin and rithmatic. It has something to do with the alpha state going away (except just before sleep).

I thought she might have some remnant memory of the blizzard as we were walking in the middle of it, trying to get to a neighbor's house. It was usually a two minute walk, but took us twenty that time.

She doesn't remember insisting on climbing up a huge slide "all by herself" at around the age of three. She got to the top, looked down and started screaming,  "Somebody help me!" Of course, Husband scurried up the ladder to the rescue.

She kinda remembers being turned loose and allowed to wallow like the piglet she was at heart. It had come a huge rain, the mud puddle was a big un, and she was looking at it longingly. This was when no one lived on our road but us and the road was a dirt trail. I found some clothes she had worn out and out grown and set her free. I hosed her down before she came in the house, and put the clothes in the trash.

She doesn't remember breaking her collar bone, for which I'm grateful. Lord knows I remember that enough for both of us.

I've saved letters to Santa, letters to the Tooth Fairy and even letters to me.

I  have a journal that I've kept a lot of the funny and strange things she said growing up. I'm so glad I did, because a lot of them would be lost to the past if I hadn't written them down.

And of course Husband has taken a gazillion pictures of her - to the point that she knew to pose before she could sit up by herself.

I think for most of us, our childhood memories are a lot of warm, fuzzy pictures in our minds. Not whole memories, but just here and there a snippet.

For me, a lot of my memories are of something either very special - like being waked up and toted to the front door to see the huge snow - or something dark and scary beyond my control.

But I have some that seem insignificant, too.

Wonder what makes the decision in our brains to keep certain memories on file, so to speak, and to put the others way back in the unreachable recesses.

Although, a certain smell, or conversation, or picture can bring something back vividly that we didn't realize was there.

Humans: We are a mystery, aren't we?