Losing my Paddington Bear teddy bear.
I was probably about one year old. We lived on a farm in northern South Africa, not too far from Johannesburg. I loved that bear but forgot it at a restaurant my parents took me to.
My father refused to go back to get it: he thought I could learn a lesson from the incident. I was far too young to learn from it though.
I cried myself to sleep.
I remember the bear had a dark blue coat with cylindrical, shiny wooden buttons.
Submitted by Davyd McColl, a 33-year old programmer, married with an 11-month old boy. Some of the best tips on how to be a father he learned from what his father *didn’t* do. He refuses to repeat his mistakes. He hopes his boy’s earliest memory is a better one than his.