Earliest Childhood Memory

Today’s blog post will be something a little more personal. Something that all of us have, some later in our lives than others. Of course we don’t remember being in the womb and we don’t remember being born or the first few weeks/months of our lives. But what about the first year? Second? Third, maybe? Our first memory that we can all remember: we all have one. So this is mine. Most children start walking at one year, sometimes even younger than that. But me? I was almost three years old and still didn’t walk. Not even once. I was carried everywhere, crawled, and was in a stroller. Yep. At two years, almost three. But I can even remember my thought process back then, strange enough as it is. And I thought: “No, don’t show Mom and Dad you can walk! Make them think you can’t so they’ll still carry you everywhere!” I knew how. I remember being two and running around in my room to get something and coming back before anyone saw me. I remember loving crawling everywhere, and being picked up. I remember thinking it was fun and hilarious. Everyone thought something was the matter with me, brought me to the doctor and nope, seemed alright and everything. So why was I taking years to walk? Most of the time, it’s because of a growth development or even mental issue. But like I said, I just didn’t want to walk. I probably knew how after a year but pretended I didn’t. And I clearly remember one evening, lying on the ground, crawling, in my living room with everyone there. My parents, grandparents, and brother. And I saw something in my kitchen I wanted to get at. So I just got up and started walking. Everyone’s faces were like this: :O

Just like that. I was all like, “Why the hell are you guys so surprised?” (No, three year olds don’t talk like that.) ‘Cause when you learn to walk apparently you do it in steps. Nope, I liked to be a mysterious child I guess. Of course my plan to be carried around forever failed because once my parents knew I could, they got me to walk. Damn. I was about to have it made . . . Isn’t it funny what we can remember?