I was starting nursery school, so I was 3 years old.
I was shown to the peg where I could hang my coat, and each peg had a picture underneath it.
Mine was a kite, but I knew that I wanted the ladybird peg.
Then I don’t know if it was the same day, but while I was using chunky red scissors, I heard a lady say, “oh she’s left-handed!” and I felt a flush of self-consciousness.
Submitted by Natalie Beale, a student at The University of East Anglia (UEA).
I can still remember sitting on my Dad’s shoulders in a very big crowd.
That’s my only recollection.
I subsequently found out that it was a crowd of around 100,000 happy Bolton Wanderers fans and family welcoming home the 1958 FA Cup winning team back with the trophy.
They had beaten Manchester United 2-0.
We were just in front of Bolton Town Hall.
I was three years old.
My dad’s been dead for a few years now. I just wish I could have one more day with him to talk about that occasion and his memories of his trip to Wembley. I would also like to thank him for making me a Bolton Wanderers fan – with all its continual grief and occasional joy!
I love you Dad!
Submitted by Vince Collins. Married to Sarah with a 12 year old son, Joseph – sadly a Chelsea fan. He is now based in the East Midlands. He owns a Marketing and PR agency providing support and consultancy in the print, paper, publishing and packaging sectors.
A windy autumn day in Suffolk, in my living room.
I was on the floor playing with a toy that was a mother duck and three baby ducks strung together in a line, and I was nervous about moving it because I hadn’t figured out what made the quacking noise start, and it kept making me jump when I turned it on unexpectedly.
I soon worked it out though – and grew to love that toy!
Submitted by Daisy.
It is early morning and I’ve just woken up.
I crawl to the corner of my crib, grab the rails and pull myself to a standing position. I steady myself and stare at the open doorway.
I see my dad walking by from my parent’s bedroom, heading down the hall. He’s wearing a dark blue and red striped bathrobe.
I don’t think he knows I’m awake, but this doesn’t bother me. I just wait patiently for him to return and take me out of my crib.
Submitted by Michelle Clark, a higher-education publishing production project manager in California. She is also working toward achieving her Masters in Library and Information Science. She intermittently blogs on her Tumblr, Saucy Ramblings and Noodly Goodness. You can follow her on Twitter here: @noodle_nose
There was a fire in the neighborhood and the fire department had a van with a bright red surface, and I reached out for it.
I just HAD to touch it. I remember where the fire was, the beautiful shiny surface and that a firefighter was talking to me.
Telling my mother about my memory a few years ago, she was stunned! She calculated, that I would have been 9 or 10 months old.
Submitted by Charlotte Hjorth.
My mum’s sister’s husband, my Uncle Terry – back from Brain Drain America for a visit in 1968 – holding me on his shoulders in our kitchen.
We weren’t a touchy-feely family and we certainly didn’t take such risks as holding children up in the air.
I sat on Terry’s shoulders and put the palms of my hands flat on the greasy Artex of the ceiling. It was like being able to touch space and my parents desperately disapproved for some reason.
When I grew up I discovered that my Mum had had an affair with Uncle Terry, that’s what they disapproved of – not the shoulder ride.
Submitted by Anstey Spraggan. Writer and general broadcaster of exquisite family secrets. Follow her on Twitter where she tweets, infrequently and without humour, here: @ansteyspraggan
When my parents took me hiking. I was about 3 years old, my dad carried me on his back and I remember waking up and looking around, a huge white frozen lake to the left and a tall grey mountain to the right and icy wind.
And that’s all. I guess it was all pretty unfriendly so I closed my eyes again.
Submitted by Lena Brossmann, a screenplay-writer from Vienna, Austria, currently living in Berlin.
I walked into my mother’s bedroom. It was a brown and yellow flowery 1970s affair of a room with curtains, bedlinen and one wall of wallpaper all in the same pattern. She was cutting something out. A picture of me, to put in her locket.
I began to cry and said “please don’t cut my head off!”
She cuddled me and shushed me and sang Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina.
Submitted by Joanne Scrace. She blogs about crochet (mostly) at Not So Granny.
Watching TV with my teenage sister, and Dracula (who I later realized is Christopher Lee) popping up on TV and hissing.
Me standing up on sister’s lap and peeing… and then running, because Christopher Lee only dreams of being as scary as Joann was as a grouchy teenager.
Submitted by Shannon Matzke.
I, being a thoroughly intelligent 2 year old, put my hands up against a hot oven door and burned all my fingers.
The clearest part of this memory is of me sitting tearfully on the edge of my parents’ bed whilst my Dad wrapped cold, wet kitchen towel squares against my fingers. This was just before I left to visit my sister in the hospital for the first time.
Submitted by Joachim Rea.