My Earliest Memory

[apple_pathways]

I've done research on the psychological phenomenon of memory, and the average age of a person's first verifiable memory is about 3.5 years, with about 90% of people dating their first memory to between 2.5 and 4.5 years.

The first memory I can independently date and verify comes one month before my 2nd birthday, when I was hospitalized over Christmas for asthma. I have a couple other memories that might or might not have occurred earlier, but I can independently verify the date I was in the hospital and the age I was at the time.

Here's what I remember:

• I remember the giant crib that I slept in while I was there. (When I retold this to my dad, he laughed and said, "Giant crib?" I then realized that the crib only seemed giant because I was so small, which is a very weird thing to realize in retrospect! At the time, it seemed massive.)
  
  
• I remember it being dark, and me still being awake, and looking out the bars of the crib. (According to my mother, I drove the nurses and the other parents on the ward crazy staying up all night talking and singing to myself. I couldn't sleep because of the steroids they gave me for my asthma.)
  
  
• Since it was Christmas, Santa came to visit us, and he gave me a plastic wind-up radio that played "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star."
  

The parts I don't remember are coming home the day after Christmas, and my parents putting the presents under the tree and pretending that day was Christmas.

So, I'm curious: what is everyone else's earliest memory? Can you verify the age/date it took place? Have you always remembered the incident, or was the memory spurred by a story told to you by family? Do you have lots of memories before the age of four, or just a few?

And more lines of scientific inquiry: were you an early talker? Were you a talkative child in general? What were your favorite games to play when you were little: imaginative role-play? Active, physical play? Solitary activities? Building/modelling?

Comments

[stick-poker.livejournal.com]

My first memory is undatable but must be quite early. It was night, I'd climbed out of my cot, and I was sat by the bars of the baby-gate on the bedroom, which was there because I could climb out of my cot. The room behind me was dark but the light was on on the landing, and I can remember everything there clearly, a big square space with five doors and the stairs, the blanket box and the blue and yellow swirly pattern on the carpet. And I'd thrown my dummy through the bars of the gate and couldn't reach it and was trying to work out whether to cry to get it back.

[apple-pathways.livejournal.com]

I love a toddler who's able to weigh the pros and cons before acting!