Often, when my dad (Big Jack) is holding Little Jack, he’ll often remark how sad it is that he (the baby) will not remember the times they share during infancy.
Many times, I myself will get an overwhelming sadness that if something should happen to me or my husband (God forbid!) that Jack-Evan will have no memory of either of us. He won’t remember the games we shared, the smiles, the books, the joy in our eyes, nor the songs we make up especially for him. He would grow up never comprehending how very, very much his parents loved him during his fragile, early days of life.
To a lesser degree, I feel saddened over the simple fact that no memory will likely remain of the entire first year of life. All of his first discoveries, the mornings filled with smiles, the wide-eyed wonderment over a tree leaf, leisurely walks around the neighborhood with mom and dad, trips to the library strapped in the baby sling… none of it will remain in his memory banks.
Memory is a weird thing. At what point do we start to lose those memories of babyhood? A baby must have some sort of memory ability, because crawling infants that fall learn not to get too close to edges. Even 3 month olds smile in recognition of a familiar face. A memory must be drawn up for a present action to occur in such a manner. I, personally, have many very young memories that occured before and during 2 years of age (as does both of my parents), yet the majority of our population has trouble remembering earlier than the age of five. I even had a psychology teacher argue a few students down in class, saying that it was scientifically impossible to remember back to a time before you were 3 years old. (Unfortunately, I was part of the small group on the receiving end of the argument! ).
I wonder if there has ever been a scientific study on childhood memory? Or perhaps just a mass survey of people asking when their earliest memory occured? I’m sure there has…hrm…maybe I should google it. Also, I wonder if the age of memory retention differs from culture to culture? Country to Country? Century to century? Psychology and human development has always fascinated me. It would be interesting to study the effects of modern technology on memory retention. We now have 2 generations of Americans who are well saturated with a visually-laden media culture. Does this affect childhood memory retention?? All of the lamaze toys, the mommy and me classes, the cartoons, the baby channel, playschool, fisher price….bright colors and visual stimulation is introduced at such a young age. Our forebearers didn’t have all of this intentional vibrancy in childhood! How has it affected the childhood memory retentions in Gen X and Gen Y? Has the ability to remember childhood increased or decreased?? Why or why not?? One would surmise that with all of the visual stimulization that is encouraged today, then children should develop visual memory retention sooner. But does it? To my knowledge, the assumption that we don’t remember before the age of 3 is still floating around.
So I ask….what is your earliest memory? And when did it occur? Now, don’t go talking about how “early memories are what your parents told you about”. I don’t buy into that. Not one bit. While I do believe it is quite possible to have a “memory feeling” about something someone had once told you happened, I do not believe it is possible to have a full visual memory, with detail and event association, if it had been made up in your imagination. The chances of a memory being real also holds more weight when it adds to the memories of someone else. Many of my childhood memories were not “remembered” by my parents until after I told them about MY specific memory - and they would later confirmed with a “yes! I think I do remember that!”.
My earliest memory, can be traced back to around 10 months of age. I was one of those weird kids that never crawled…I rolled everywhere. There is a distinct still image (many of my early memories are still photographic type images) in my head where I had just rolled over and was looking under a closed door that was raised about an inch or so off the floor. The carpet is dark brown shag, and I can into the room from under the door. It’s daylight, but the light is off in the room, and there is sun light streaming through a breezy curtain. I distinctly remember the feeling that I was “looking for someone”. This memory was confirmed in my teen years - I was looking for Uncle Danny (my Godfather). He lived with us at the time, and apparantly I looked for him a LOT and was delighted whenever I “found him”.
My next series of earliest memories - which are numerous and VERY vivid - range from age 1.5 to right after I turned 3 years old. I know this time frame because it’s when we lived in a certain trailer…..we moved from there when I was 3.5 years old.
I remember the “layout” of the trailer….but 98% of my memories from that time frame occured in the living room, in the kitchen, in the hallway, or outside. It’s odd to me that I have only one memory of my bedroom and no memories of my parents room (even though I slept with my mom as a baby).
Before the age of 3 and a half years old….I remember….
- The day I got a splinter in my hand from climbing in dad’s rented Uhaul truck
- Playing on my swingset
- Playing on my fisher price blue & yellow skates at the bottom of the porch steps
- Having a crush on an “older boy” (in a blue shirt) who was playing on my swingset one day (I remember standing at my bedroom window watching him - my only memory of my bedroom at that trailer!)
- Biting my mom’s leg when she wouldn’t let me talk on the phone (WHILE she was on the phone)
- Watching my mom and Granny leave for a Bingo game one night and being sad
- Hiding behind the couch when my uncle, aunt, and their two sons came to visit (I was a shy kid :))
- Dad pulling me around the neighborhood in my red wagon (and falling out one day!)
- Dad letting me sit on his lap to “drive” his big pickup truck around the block
- The first time I rode a city bus (Dad took me one day as a treat…I had never ridden one).
- Going to daycare..and crying when mom left
- Going to Kmart and eating breakfast with mom
- Eating with the Easter Bunny at Kmart…and feeling sad when I noticed human hair sticking out the back of his bunny head
- Being forced to eat green peas at daycare, even though I hated them
- Laying on a mat that mom would make me in the middle of the living room floor so I could watch TV
- Watching the Space Shuttle Challenger crash live on TV in early 1986
- Getting mad at my neighbor friend Lonnie when she colored on my Alvin & the Chipmonks book
Those are just some of my memories…the biggest ones. They’re all very vivid, as if I just experienced them. As I approach 3, my memories increase more and more. For instance, I remember everything about our move from the trailer to the house I grew up in (where my parents are currently still living)…it was built new for us. I remember the first time I went there, sitting with dad on the floor before the inside walls were even put in and him saying (proudly) “This is going to be our new house!” (he was drinking a pepsi). The memories from ages 3-5 are so vivid and so many that it’s sort of like watching a tape play. A few things have escaped my mind as I’ve gotten older, but I’m still able to recall the majority of the memories from that time period.
My mom and dad have this same ability to remember childhood well, so perhaps it’s an inherited trait?? My mom who was born in 1942, remembers using the edge of a crib to pull up - and then chewing on it - as a baby just learning to stand (around 1 year). She also remembers her mom rocking her and singing “Bayou My Baby” and a dog that jumped up and bit her heel as her dad was carrying her (she has had a phobia of strange dogs ever since). My dad holds many memories like these as well. My mom says that her mother (who was born in 1912 and passed away in 2001) was able to remember her own early childhood like that as well. My husband Kevin remembers many things from the age of 2-4, but he can not pinpoint which one might be the earliest.
Most of the adults I talk to (even people my age) claim they can’t remember earlier than 4 or 5 years old. I have some friend that I went to kindergarten with who can’t remember anything about that year at all.
So, that all leaves me wondering. Is memory ability hereditary? Or was there something -some pin pointable marker - in my childhood…my parents childhood…that triggered this ability to remember so vivadly the years of toddler-hood??
When will Jack-Evan’s memories kick in? I sat here tonight, after we returned from a baseball game (which he watched in amazment, and smiled at many times), thinking that he will have no memory of the fun we had tonight. At what age, I wonder, will he begin to retain…to store up…childhood memories for adulthood? What small piece of his daily life over the next 2 years will he grow up to remember? I often think about how everything I’m doing right now, and everything we do over the next 2 years, will affect him greatly in his adulthood.
What will I be doing? What will his father be doing? What will HE himself be doing the day…the minute…the second…that his retention banks click in and permanently stores that one “earliest” memory, forever captured and labeled by an adult Jack-Evan as “When I was a child, I remember……”
Memories are good things to have, and the sooner we can capture them…retain them..bottle them up…the better. Childhood passes so extremely fast, that, if you think about it, it ends up being no more than a collection of memories. How truly sad it is that some people lose YEARS of their life by not being able to remember anything about them!
I'm a quirky SAHM to 1.5 kids, lover of family, laughing, cloudless days, & chocolate mini bites. When I'm not reliving childhood through my toddler, you'll probably find me with my nose in a book or MP3 headphones in my ears. Sometimes both.