Early Memory Theme

I noticed the Theme of the Week question on the OD home page and I felt compelled to write.

What is the earliest memory that I have.

I have two early memories, one which I think is pretty normal and the other that makes even me question myself.  The first memory I will mention is from when I was about 6-8 months old.  We were still living in Baltimore in a row house with a thin sidewalk from the back door to the gate at the end of the narrow yard.  Beyond the gate was an alley and across the alley and a bit to the right was a playground with a swing set.  I can distinctly remember sitting in a stroller looking at kids on the swings.  I want to say that it was my brother and sister on the swings, but they would only have been 2 and 4 years old.  If it was them on the swings then either I was left alone or they were on the swings alone.

I described this memory when I was a teen and I can remember my parents doubting me, but when I gave them details they agreed that I was describing our backyard at that time.  Many, many years later, and not a few years ago when Google maps provided satellite views I was able to see our old backyard from above and damn if the sidewalk, alley and playground aren’t right where I remember them.  I can also distinctly remember sliding down the wood stairs, feet first on my stomach (that’s how my sibs and I were taught to come down the stairs before we mastered walking up and down).  We moved from Baltimore around the time I turned one and our next house was one story, so no stairs.

The memory that I have always been hesitatant to mention is the memory of my birth.  For many years as a youngster I would have a regularly recurring nightmare.  In that dream I would feel smothered with a pounding, pulsating, swirling noise all around me.  Finally, the dream would break with the smothering lifted and lights and normal voices around me.  For some reason that dream would always scare the hell out of me and I would always wake up in a sweat and often mid-scream/yell/shout.  Maybe it was a dream of birth and not my birth, but as soon as I intrepreted it as a birth dream I lost my fear of it and eventually stopped having the dream altogether.  I will sometimes catch small bits of the nightmare around the edges of my dreaming, but nothing like the full-on, smothering that I experienced as a kid.

So there are my earliest memories.

Ender is out.