I don’t know what you’re going through life doing if you’re not really trying to collect some really great memories. ~ Channing Tatum
Lives are a representation of the yearning to collect. A person isn’t just bone and muscle, blood and sinew. Human beings are biological recording devices, branding everything we experience and storing it within.
If we could invent a machine to replay the database of our gray matter, we might attain omniscient recall. Perhaps we could recount what really happened at the scene of that car accident or describe the details of a face glimpsed during a robbery or dissect that final, longing look or remember our promises to take out the trash.
As with anything we collect, our memories play favorites. And favor instances we’d like to forget.
Who knows why the first thing I remember is being eighteen months old? I can see the lights go out as my mother covered me with warm clothes from the dryer. I feel the soft safety of my cocoon, and I hear my shrieking laughter as I spring from the pile’s center and spew garments everywhere.
Or why I remember running into the barren cornfield and cutting my bare feet on the stumps.
Or how I can still feel the black-and-white spotted coat of my pet cow Boo.
Or why I see myself squatting over a mole hole and peeing, because going inside meant walking too far.
Or where I hid when I spilled unset ice trays from the freezer and listened to Mom rant about who could’ve left water all over the kitchen floor.
Or what my dog’s food tasted like.
All memories I collected as a toddler, snatches of time I can’t seem to forget.
And that’s what makes my collection of memories grand: It’s eclectic and bizarre and weird and unexplainable. I’m grateful for the moments that rise to the top.
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Photograph Credit: Andra Watkins
This is part of a series of pictures about making memories. If you liked the story why not share it with your friends? Let’s meet on Facebook or Twitter. If you prefer pictures you will surely like my Instagram. I’ve collected inspirational things and more on Pinterest! Any comments? Write them below!
13 Comments
A pet cow? Seriously?
Yes. I loved old Boo.
Writing a list like that would be a great poetry project.
I only approach poetry when I don’t mean to. Ha.
You ate dog food? Ewwww. Although, not having a cat or dog growing up, I can’t say I wouldn’t have done the same. I remember having turtles (Myrtle and Yertle) and goldfish (unceremoniously flushed at various times). We freed the turtles to a local lake at one point, but I always yearned for a puppy or kitten. Dad was the animal lover, mom was not. Mom ruled. This is why I am a crazy cat lady today.
Yes. My dog’s food was on the breezeway, between the garage and the house. I can still see myself staring at it, wondering what it tasted like, because hey, if the dog liked it so much, it couldn’t be bad, right? (I was probably two, long before I realized dogs also ate poo.)
Wow. That’s a great quote.
Hope to see you on the 28th!!!
It really has too many ‘reallys.’ 🙂 But it’s still true.
I’m there at 10am on the 28th. Look forward to making something happen.
Good quote by fabulous eye candy (Hello…Channing). 🙂 My sister is like you, she remembers things from a very young age. Sometimes I wonder if we actually lived in the same house! 🙂
I don’t know why I remember being young so vividly. Sometimes I can almost step through a portal and be three again.
so true – if you are able to let your inner child live within you, you can do it with memories, places and dreams as well… ♥…
liebe Grüße,
Maccabros
I remember my friend and I eating Milk Bone dog biscuits and wondering why there was sand in them. Lovely post, Andra
i remember getting out of my crib and piling up all my stuff in the middle of the room and my mother not having a good reaction to it.
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