Faded Memories

Childhood memories are such fragile things, slipping away from our grasp without us realizing. How much of your childhood do you actually remember? For me it’s not that much. If you can’t either, don’t feel bad. It’s pretty common among humans. It is called infantile amnesia. This makes it so you are unable to, or can barely remember, from when you were four or younger. Its a shield to protect us from the earliest times in our life that our brains were not ready to store or process properly. Understanding this makes it clear why so many early childhood memories feel isolated or incomplete, as if they belonged to someone else entirely. Because in some way they do. Still, some memories manage to linger, even if only in pieces. 

I can still remember a small but vivid memory from Pre-School: Color Day, when we all had to wear one color. I was matching with Connor and Gino, my two best friends, and we stood together in a line to form the rainbow. This might seem small and insignificant but it’s stayed with me over the years. You will forget most of your early childhood so it is important to keep things from that time. Whether that be a photo, a toy, or even a drawing you did. These small things can act like a bookmark in your life-ordinary yet powerful things that bring forgotten moments back to the surface. 

Just like Bob Dylan once said “Take care of all your memories. For you cannot relive them”. I made the mistake of not keeping many things from my childhood. And most of the stuff I did keep got destroyed in a flood. Now I lost those tangible memories and they can’t be replaced. All that is left are scattered, half-formed memories, like sand slipping through my hand – impossible to completely grasp. A puzzle that will never fully be complete again; I hear snippets of Connor and Gino’s laugh ringing through our playground, fragments of emotion that pass by too quickly, and shards of memories – partial conversations, quick glimpse of us playing, the warmth from hugs – but the full picture is always out of reach. They are forever lost in time and without those precious objects, it becomes harder to remember who we were before we grew up.

One of the biggest mistakes for me was not staying in contact with my two childhood best friends Connor and Gino. Connor, Gino and I weren’t just friends. We were the bestest of friends. I think at some point we stopped seeing one another as just friends, but instead as family. When you saw one of us, the other two were close by. We were inseparable. The Three Musketeers. Three Peas in a Pod. To others these might just be “nicknames” but in reality that was us. The bond the three of us shared. Connor had flat black hair that fell right above his eyebrows and would sweep to the sides sometimes, somehow it was both neat yet messy. Gino had red, slightly curly hair with freckles that littered his face and wore glasses. The two of them were really sweet and always had something funny to say. Connor was always the quiet one while Gino was the outgoing one. I was somewhere in the middle. I could be loud with my friends but I could also be really shy when meeting new people. We complimented each other. Where one person might not be confident, then one of the others would be there to support them and lift them up. If Gino or I was being too loud, Connor was the one who would be the one to calm us down. Even if he was embarrassed at times, Connor  still loved us. Though there were times he’d give up and join us in being crazy. We all were each other’s anchors when we were younger.

As the years go by I started to realize  just how delicate memories can be. I also noticed that  sometimes I can’t tell if my “memories” with them are real or if I made them up. So I ask my mom if these memories were real or if I created them. Even though her memory isn’t too good now, she is able to remember that time better than me. And so far my recollection of them is all real.  Knowing that actually brought a strange sense of relief—happy that the moments I clung onto weren’t imagined, but pieces of my past that honestly happened.

I can remember each of us asking our parents “can we please go to Adryannas/Connors/Gino’s house please?” almost every single day. Sometimes we asked multiple times a day, giving them our best puppy-dog eyes. We would go to each other’s houses to play Lego Indiana Jones or Lego Star Wars on our XBox 360s. I can still hear how we would fight over who was playing who, the rapid clicking of our buttons as we fought the enemies, and our excited shouts when we won. Connor would try and think things through before acting. On the other hand, Gino would charge in right away without a plan and laugh if he failed. I would tease Gino when he failed but would pout when Connor beat me. The three of us would sit on the floor for hours, with our knees bumping into each other and way too close to the TV, trying to take in the moment. We would only take breaks to eat but even then we’d eat and play at the same time. Time always seemed to slow down when we were like this. This is what I want to go back to. It didn’t matter what we were doing, all that mattered was that we were with each other.

Or the time the three of us went to the park and I declared I was going to marry Connor on my 5th birthday. I had the dress picked out and everything. I told my mom, “I’m going to marry him today! I want to wear this dress!” It was a pink princess dress that had sparkles on the top part with tulle at the bottom of various shades of pink. That dress had made me feel like a princess waiting for her prince. I would go around shouting “I love you Connor” in the park, the gym, even McDonalds. I’m pretty sure most people from the town knew I was in love with Connor since I wasn’t shy about announcing my love for him. Back then we felt like we could do anything. The world was ours and we were happy.

A memory that will always stay with me is when Gino ran up to my mom who was talking to one of the other moms and I was standing next to her. He ran up and proudly stated “I kissed your daughter!” Before running back to the playground we always played on. My mom was confused and in disbelief before she started laughing. Gino had kissed my sister before coming to tell us about it. I was in disbelief. I snapped out of it real quick before I chased after him for kissing my little sister. “How dare you kiss my sister!” I remember shouting as I chased him around the playground. Thinking back, we probably looked really funny. Me chasing him, Gino cracking up, Connor shaking his head and our parents off to the side watching the chaos unfold.

Even though we aren’t in contact anymore I cherish these memories with them. These will remain some of the best and bright times in my childhood. Reminders of innocence, chaos, and friendship. The kind you wouldn’t change for the world. These moments shaped me into who I am today.

As time went by I realized I can remember all of these smaller details of Connor and Gino, from how their hair looked down to how they acted and dressed. I can picture the way Connor’s smile used to be, where it was a shy but luminescent smile, or the way Gino’s shirts were always a little too big, making him look a little smaller than he actually was. I can even remember some of our memories of us together as kids. Like me declaring my love for Connor or Gino kissing my sister. These scenes play through my head like an old short film- brief, grainy, moving, but still untouchable. But I can’t remember what their eyes looked like. The very things people say are a window to the soul. I can remember they were kind, funny, and smart. They could always get me to laugh, even when I was down. Though now I have to ask myself were Connor’s eyes brown, hazel, or blue? What about Ginos, were they green, blue, or brown? I can’t remember and that troubles me. Because of this I wish I realized the value and importance of photos and cherished the small things.  Now that I’m older I understand how fragile memories can be, how easily the time flies while the feelings stubbornly stay behind. This leaves me wanting to hold onto every little thing I once overlooked.

So at the beginning of this school year, my senior year, I decided I was going to make a scrapbook. I wanted to document both the major and minor things of this school year – first day, graduation, and anything in between. Doing this is my way of protecting the moments I know I’ll want to look back on, especially because I always hated when my mom took photos of me. There aren’t many good ones. Because of this my selection of photos and memories is very small. I won’t repeat the same mistake again, which is not realizing the worth of something until it’s gone. From this, I learned to always make as many memories as you can and take lots of photos. One way to help jog your memory is keeping things that people may think are insignificant, but it’s important to you. Sometimes even seeing a photo or an object can bring a memory back to life. You never know what you have until it’s gone, so don’t take it for granted. I feel like I took the time I spent with them for granted – not just them, my other friends and family as well. Did I have control over the flood that destroyed most of my memories? No, I didn’t. I could have had more photos. But I was stubborn as a child and refused to get my picture taken. The scrapbook has become my way of preserving what time tries so hard to delete, helping me remember not just the moments, but the people and emotions that mattered the most.

“Golden times -you & me- fading into memory …” by jinterwas is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

“Childhood” by susivinh is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0.

“White Flower” by @Doug88888 is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.