Wigs & bathrooms.
Living in Munich, where my mother had served as a US Marine.
She had a great number of wigs in the bathroom, and when I would wake up at night to “go”, I would sit – sideways – on the seat and put on a wig.
I remember the hair tickling my back.
Years later my mother (who had become, perhaps always been, mentally ill) abandoned me and I grew up in a foster home.
I won’t ever know what the wigs were about.
Submitted by Jonathan Eells.
I am observing an enveloping blackness.
I turn my head to one side to see pulsing pink accompanied by the chiming of a glockenspiel and it is warm and comfortable.
I look the other way and out of the blackness comes orangey-yellow and the roar of a snowplough.
I wake up and see my nightlight through the bars of my crib and cry until my parents come to get me.
I can’t explain because it isn’t until I’m older that I will have the words to describe a dream which became a nightmare.
Submitted by Holly Adams ex-pat Canadian living in England. She blogs about genealogy and tweets about family, family trees, technology, local government, and a lot about technology and local government (and sometimes about music). Follow her on Twitter here: @HollyAdamsUK
I was 3 or 4 and I was hideously afraid of the part in ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory’ where the girl turns into a blueberry and after watching it at my Grandparents’ home and becoming rather traumatised, my Granny said I could do ANYTHING I wanted.
So I decided I would eat my dinner under the table with her, with the tablecloth acting as curtains and my Granddad crawling around the kitchen making animal noises.
It was the best meal of my life.
Submitted anonymously.
The day my mum came home from hospital with my new baby brother.
I was almost 3 and she had been away for nearly 2 weeks.
They brought the baby in and laid him on their bed.
I really wanted my mum but she was fussing over the baby. In an effort to be “noticed” I picked up one of my mums stiletto heeled shoes and threw it at him.
According to my mum it narrowly missed his head and could have been very nasty if it had made contact.
All eyes turned on me and it looked like turning nasty until my wonderful Grandad scooped me up and announced we were off to get some ice cream.
All was forgotten when we came back.
Submitted by Pat Mackay. Now a mother of 3, she sometimes wishes that her aim had been better!
I distinctly remember (around 2 or 3 years old) going to sit on the potty that was in the center of the bathroom at the top of the stairs at my family friends house.
I remember sitting and looking down the stairs, feeling exposed, and thinking that the door should probably be shut. 🙂
Submitted by Arron Chapman. NYC living Digital agency producer, lover of the beautiful game, and aspiring treasure hunter. Follow him on Twitter here: @chapmanarron
India, in the year 1984; I was 2 years old and in other news, a new car by Suzuki called 800 was released in two colors white and red, in Delhi. I used to spend hours watching those tiny cars zipping past from our second floor balcony!
Mum could finish all her work while i saw that car.
Submitted by Sirisha who blogs at Vevisia. Follow her on Twitter here: @vevisia
The Rock and the Queen Mother.
It’s the height of summer, I’m 3 and the flowers I’m holding are wilting.
The Queen Mother will soon visit our little Norfolk town but she’s taking ages so I climb on a rock. I remember when her helicopter flew over I asked if she was going to parachute down.
When she finally arrived (by car) she came straight to me. This is when I noticed my Mum desperately gesturing at me to get off the ancient landmark I was currently dancing on. The last royalty to visit our town hundreds of years before used the rock to get on his horse.
She liked the flowers, I don’t know what she thought of the dancing.
Submitted by Henry Walsh, an artist.
As an infant, I had two occurrences of pneumonia, and was briefly hospitalized during at least one of the bouts.
Given the age, I must assume it was the latter for which I remember being dropped off in a crib in the pediatric unit of the hospital.
I have vague recollection of being happy to see my mother, and vivid memory of being outraged when she left me behind in the crib.
Submitted by Jim Millard.
This is my earliest memory.
Or at least I think it’s my earliest memory.
There could be something earlier.
But I just don’t know.
I do have one memory that could be earlier.
But I could just be remembering the photograph.
Though, I am sure that I remember.
But I know that there is a photograph.
So I have decided that this is my earliest memory.
I don’t know for sure.
It has no photograph.
So it must be a memory.
I am young.
So it must be early.
I have another memory of being in a cot.
But I have decided that this is my earliest memory;
I am sitting in a pram, I am being pushed home from the shops, I am on the corner of my road, it is warm, I am eating from a brown paper bag full of salted cashew nuts. I am very happy.
Submitted by Alice Ritchie. She claims she’s not a very interesting person, whose aim in life is to become interesting; still young, so there is still time. Also, she is clearly indecisive. Follow on twitter here if you wish @TheAmazingAloo.
But as she claims, not interesting yet, so don’t get your hopes up.
I’ve just eaten an ant.
Black and tiny; it tastes sharp.
A tinny metal coats my tongue.
Submitted by Saaleha Idrees Bamjee, a South African most-times writer, some-times print designer and all-time papyrophile. She blogs at www.saaleha.com. Follow her on Twitter here: @saaleha