How photographs and family stories corrupt your own individual memories

[Palladium]

I remember being bathed in the butler sink underneath the Ascot gas boiler - not the most reliable thing to get started!

[IgorStrav]

I remember being bathed in the butler sink underneath the Ascot gas boiler - not the most reliable thing to get started!

I also remember being bathed in the sink in what my mother used to refer to as 'an upper and downer'.  Sit on the draining board, with your feet in the water in the sink for the face part and then stand up (and you needed to be small) for the rest 

[Greensleeves]

I can't think that my generation had many photographs to corrupt our memories; photographs were few and far between in my childhood, and generally reserved for special occasions such as a caravan holiday in Whitby or a beach-hut weekend at Felixstowe.

So my memories are pristine, unsullied, and I can date them all relatively easily since my father was in the RAF and we moved at regular intervals.  Thus I can clearly remember going to a shop, my father buying me sherbert, and then coming back and playing with it before the fire, with an egg-cup and a bowl.  I was about two at the time.  Fast-forward less than a year, and I was in Norfolk, standing admiring the shiny red wheels of a new friend's  scooter.  A basket of broken eggs, when I lived in Yorkshire - aged 6 - and was sent to the NAAFI with a list, and got distracted when I met friends on the way home...  All of these memories still jewel-bright.  My memories, not caught by camera, not shared with others.  Just mine and not corrupted.

[Andrew Tarr]

All of these memories still jewel-bright.  My memories, not caught by camera, not shared with others.  Just mine and not corrupted.

I think this is the tricky point we are discussing.  Some of us are convinced that we are remembering things exactly as they were 'recorded'.  Others believe that the brain does not work quite like that, but each time a memory is recalled, some features get emphasised while others may fade out.  A computer's hard-drive is quite a good model for a human memory, and I'm not sure I would trust one of those to remain uncorrupted for several decades .... 

[Mart 'n' Al]

Temporal "bookmarks" are useful, helping date, identify and validate memories, as Greensleeves says.

Martin

[ThrelfallYorky]

Like and earlier poster, a "Tan-Sad" pram helped me to fix an early memory. I mentioned to my mother that I remembered her pushing me along a dark road, very wet, I could see her facing me over the dark blue ( lined cream) "canopy thing that covered where I was and also was fastened more vertically to help keep off the weather. Her coat was soaked, a "Teddy bear" fabric, normally beige, but looking dark, and rain was running down her face and hair.
Because I described the Tan Sad she had at the time, she knew it was before I was a couple of months over 2, as she let a relative who didn't live anywhere near us, have it at the end of the Year, for her first child, as she also had a more stately grey Silver Cross pram (posher!) . She also knew when she had soaked that coat through, apparently it was a late evening downpour as she brought me home along the main road, before she turned off towards the lane.
The funny thing is I'd so little memory of the Silver Cross, only of being in it in the garden once, and a sheep frightening me, and said so. Mum replied that she wasn't surprised, it was so heavy to push up a steep uneven hill that she gave up to it, and they put it in the barn!

[Finley 1]

seperation anxiety or wot!!   I do not know.... but I was bathed in the bloomin sink under the kitchen window until I was ELEVEN and protested   extremely loudly...


Mother of mine...  !!!! memories are changing daily about our relationship and not all for the good.


Finley

[Annette7]

Two things I remember quite vividly.   My father used to use the cinders from the fire to make a path in the garden.   When I was about 3/4 I fell over on the path and can remember clear as day being sat on the kitchen table while my mother bathed and cleaned up my face.   Nearly 70 years later I still have a tiny black speck above my top lip as a permanent reminder.

The second incident was when I was aged 5.   I received a red tricycle with white mudguards and a white metal basket on the front.   My best friend had received the self same tricycle which was blue.   When we were out together with our Mum's one day, as children still do, she and I swapped bikes.   When we came to a steep hill we were both told to stop - she did, I didn't.  I can still remember the panic as I hurtled down the hill unable to stop.   Reason being, I'm left handed and my own tricycle duly had a left hand brake, but my friend's had a right hand brake.   I don't remember anything except hurtling down the hill but learnt later that a man near the bottom of the hill heard my Mum screaming and looked up to see me hurtling down.  He was working in his front garden and managed to leap out and stop me from heading onto the main built up road at the bottom of the hill.   If he hadn't managed to stop me I might not even be here now to tell the tale. 

Annette 

[mlrfn448]

I do have some very early memories, of before I was three - some were talked about and 'reinforced' over the years, but others I have never spoken of.
For example, I remember sitting in my High Chair, next to my Dad, at the table, and a specific Aunty was there.
I clearly see the table with faces all around (I come from a large family).
Yet this memory confused me as I was growing up, as my High Chair was always next to my mother, and the Aunty was never there.
I assumed I must have just got mixed. Now I realise that this must have been a special occassion, and my High Chair was next to my Father, simply because my mother's sister was sitting next to my mother.
(With hindsight, I assume a fuss was made of me, etc, but I dont remember that. I just remember having the knowledge of an Aunt being there)
I never spoke of this because I assumed I must have got mixed up. I remember thinking about it occassionally and being very confused. But I can still see the picture in my mind of the table, etc

I have a few other memories of before I was 3. A holiday we took when I was 2.
Since my mother's death, I have found some photos taken in the garden, she has written on the back that I am nearly 3. But I actually remember this occassion. (But some will say I only rememer because of the photos)