Memories

My earliest childhood memory is of being in a hospital hallway. I had wanted to play "mommy" and had put my baby brother in my dolly stroller. The aluminum piece of crap snapped like a twig and speared the baby in the chin as he fell to the ground. (He survived and he's a handsome man with a dashing scar just here).

I also remember a time when we went to a department store. I was maybe 3 and very proud because I had dressed myself while Mom was occupied with all the babies. I remember getting out of the car and Mom's sudden gasp and going straight to the little girls department and being at the counter while Mom purchased a pair of panties and her explaining that she wouldn't need a shopping bag.

I have an early memory of being rocked in the dark by my much adored maternal grandfather and of him calling me "Princess". He called me that until the day he died. And I have a very early memory, wispy and vague, that has to do with a kitchen that wasn't ours and a bag of Puffed Wheat cereal in a corner. Mom has been unable to place this in an historical context for me but I know it is real.

What do those fascinating recollections have to do with anything? It is that my childhood memories, including later ones that are better fleshed out with detail, live only in my mind. If I hope to keep them I will need to write them down because otherwise they are vulnerable to the caprice of age. (Not that I have forgotten anything of substance yet. Grammar rules and names of people don't count). The Child, on the other hand, has a complete record through the age of 4 or 5 because we obsessively videotaped her in the early years.

She found "the baby tapes" yesterday and has been indulging in retrospective marathon. She was adorable, to be sure. Chubby, chubby little cheeks and one of the most pixilated, bubbly little personalities you will ever encounter. (The latter is still pretty much the case). She thoroughly enjoys watching herself and admiring her babyish cleverness. But it gets me thinking about her memories. How many of them are "live" in the sense, like mine, that their imprint was left on her brain in the course of being experienced and how many of them are "Memorex" because she has seen it on tape over and over? Do her memories feel different? Can she distinguish between having actually lived through something versus watching it as a sort of rerun? Is it valid when she says she "remembers" some moment in her infancy, which she really can't possibly because she was an infant but we have it on tape?

I'm just wondering.