# Your Earliest Memory **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 9, 2001, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233 "2001-01-09T22:20:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Rebo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rebo/32/13005_2.png) [@Rebo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rebo)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2001, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/21 "2001-01-10T18:56:53Z")
My earliest memory is from about 2 or 3 years old. I had a pet box turtle who stayed in one corner of our backyard. One morning I went to his corner, and he wasn’t there. I freaked out, crying and searching for him. I found him near a tree in another corner of the yard. Whew. ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2001, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/22 "2001-01-10T19:19:39Z")
Long memories run in my family. I remember a lot of stuff, though most of it is fragments: 1. Nursing. Just the feel of it with my eyes closed, just for a fraction of a moment. I can feel the shape and texture of the nipple, and the structures under the skin (all flattened and stretched). My mom stopped nursing me when I was about 6 months old. 2. Being carried to the laundromat sitting in the laundry basket (on top of the clothes). I can smell the air (sunny slightly damp morning smells), smell the laundry detergent, and feel the swing-thump of the basket as it bumped against my mom’s leg. This was a regular activity, and I loved it. Maybe 6-8 months old? I could sit up but don’t know if I could crawl. Secondary memory on that, though - I remember that one because I remember having remembered it when I was about 2, when I wanted to ride in the laundry basket like I used to, but I was too big. I recall being very disappointed (at 2), and being angry that the basket seemed a lot smaller than it had been. It seemed to me that I was always the same size, but everything else kept shrinking and shrinking, and it frustrated me that I couldn’t make it stop. I remember a ton of other cool things, like the visceral joy of hearing my mother laugh with delight at something I did (pre-walking), and moments when I was really proud of myself (like when I figured out _all by myself_ that the still water in a pool was really **ice** , and therefore could be walked across…), and moments when I learned something new about someone, like that my mom couldn’t fix everything because she couldn’t fix my busted balloon (sew it, sew it!). Loads of stuff from about 1-3 years old, some stuff for the next few years, almost nothing from around 6-7, and gradually more again later. Fortunately, I forgot most of the awful stuff about my early years. More than plenty of that, too, but I didn’t store it for easy recall (hence the variations in volume of recall over the years). **sliv** , that story is priceless… remembering what it was like is one of the reasons I find watching my son so amazing. I hope he manages to remember some of this stuff, too… ---
**Author:** ![xizor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xizor/32/102_2.png) [@xizor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xizor)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2001, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/23 "2001-01-10T19:28:57Z")
My earliest memory is screaming my head off at the doctor’s office as I got a shot in the butt. I was 2 or 3. ---
**Author:** ![Gunslinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4491bb/32.png) [@Gunslinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gunslinger)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2001, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/24 "2001-01-11T02:18:03Z")
I remember cutting the tip of my finger off when I was 3. ---
**Author:** ![Mercutio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/51bf81/32.png) [@Mercutio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mercutio)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2001, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/25 "2001-01-11T02:27:41Z")
My earliest memory is of when I was either 3 or 2. It is of me and my dad at the park and i am pushing myself along on one of those plastic minituare cars. …I miss my dad. ---
**Author:** ![Eo\_Echo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ebca7d/32.png) [@Eo\_Echo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eo_Echo)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2001, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/26 "2001-01-11T04:23:01Z")
My earliest memory is watching the fireworks from the vantage point of my father’s shoulders on the 4th of July, 1976 in Philadelphia. I was almost 2. ---
**Author:** ![SpartanDC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b2d939/32.png) [@SpartanDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpartanDC)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2001, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/27 "2001-01-11T07:34:13Z")
I remember being in my crib playing with my Busy Box. It had this cool thing on it where you pushed down something and it made a little metal ball shoot up a tube and ring a bell. Hit it over and over. I must have been about 2. I thought it was rare to remember that far back, but I guess not! ---
**Author:** ![Homer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/df788c/32.png) [@Homer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Homer)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2001, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/28 "2001-01-11T13:49:31Z")
Mom carrying me up the stairs of our neighbor’s split level ranch house. Debbie (neighbor) offers me candy from a crystal holder. Mom says I can’t have any. Mom puts me on the brown shag carpet, as my brother Jacob pushes by to play in Jason’s room down the hall. I want to play, so I crawl down the hall after them. They don’t want me in the room, so they put a giant teddy bear blocking the hall. I sat and cried because I was disappointed. We moved out of that neighborhood when I was about 18 months. –Tim ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2001, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233/29 "2001-01-11T19:36:14Z")
Earliest memory: being in my family’s apartment, watching the new battery-operated toy robot my uncle bought for me walk across the tabletop, stop, open its chest, fire flashing “laser” lights, close its chest, and repeat. Second-earliest memory: watching a TV commercial talk about something you can buy by calling a number right now. So I promptly toddled to the phone and started dialing away at random… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-earliest-memory/49233.md?page=1)