Daddy Damson claims to remember detailed events from his very early years. Until recently I was deeply suspicious of this claim because I didn’t think I remembered anything much before school but some of the things that Blue does have triggered brief notions that I’m convinced must be memories from my early childhood. Blue has taken to coming downstairs by awkwardly sliding on his tummy and the first time he did it the sensation of the warm burn of the carpet on your bare tummy came flooding back to me. I remembered! Well, I don’t really remember coming down the stairs as a toddler but I remember the feeling of sliding bumpily down some stairs and feeling a warm itch of wool carpet. I don’t remember the day, what I was wearing, or how old I was but it is a whisp of something that I am positive did happen.
This feeling struck me again the first time Blue decided to lie on his tummy in the bath. I was transported back to a feeling of cheeky happiness from licking bubbles on the surface of the bath and tasting the soapy rainbows. Again, I couldn’t remember a particular bathtime, just a moment that must have been sitting in the darkest depths of my mind.
Now, if I think about it, a lot of my memories are like that. I don’t remember specifics I remember smudgy, sepia elements: the warmth of the kitchen on winter evenings; the metallic taste from sucking a set of keys; eating coconut ice so sweet that it makes the enamel on your teeth zing; and just running for the sheer joy of it.
So, Daddy Damson I am sorry for doubting you, perhaps it is possible to remember even your very early years, it’s just taken Blue to make me realise where my own memories were kept.
By Kirsty Hornblow
It’s funny what jogs a memory isn’t it? For years I had a vauge memory of rolling down a grassy slope in the garden as a young child and then bam! One day I was reading a book with Ozzy and spotted an old picture of Humpty Dumpty and suddenly I was climbing out of a bed and peeling off nursery rhyme wallpaper!
ps. see you at Blogfest!