Memory triggers

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Most of us have memory ‘triggers’. That is, certain things that automatically call to mind various associations and memories when we experience them (again). Frequently it takes the form of a song, but might also be exposure to a particular food (remember the critic in the film “Ratatouille?”), or a scent (I’m sure if I smelled a freshly made mimeograph copy, or ‘ditto’ now, I’d instantly be transported to my third grade desk).

I’m sure many of us initially enjoyed listening to classic rock radio when it first came out because of the all the triggers that resulted from songs we hadn’t heard in years, but soon found ourselves despising the format once it became clear that frequent repetition was destroying these associative triggers.

I occasionally have another type of association and I’m curious if anyone else experiences it. I remember as a young kid looking at a particular type of cloud cover when I was visiting my grandparents. It was remarkable to me because even though it was morning most of the light, due to the cloud cover pattern, was coming from the west. I also get this trigger sometimes in the afternoon when the reverse occurs and most of the light is coming from the east. I also get strong triggers from ‘green’ skies I immediately associate with the first time I can recall experiencing tornado weather.

Does anyone else experience memory triggers from atmospheric conditions?

Any other interesting, unusual, or highly reliable memory triggers you care to share?

2

Immense number of triggers in general. E.g., last night watching some Big Game commercials I suddenly remembered how to pronounce “Coca-Cola” in Croatian. (We don’t usually watch commercials due to using DVRs and streaming devices.)

Atmospheric? An absolutely clear blue sky with a few large puffy white clouds takes me back to early childhood.

More generally weather-related. There’s this special smell of certain late summer, warm dry mornings that remind me of certain teenage events.

3

I experience these triggers all the time, but I especially remember feeling them on my first visit to Paris in 1999. It had been almost 40 years since the last time I studied or spoke French, and all of the sudden the language was alive, surrounding me. Words that I hadn’t thought of in all that time suddenly came back to me. Not verb tenses or genders but simple nouns suddenly returned as if I’d heard them yesterday. And I found myself remembering specific occurrences back in French class. Walking across the Pont Neuf or through the Tuileries Garden, I could almost hear my French teacher describing them to us in class, or seeing pictures of them in our textbook.

4

Smells do it for me every time.

Songs not so much

5

I memorized a poem to recite at my kindergarten graduation. I quickly forgot it; by junior high, I couldn’t remember a word.

At my high school graduation party, I suddenly remembered it all and recited it again.