Memories

I have learnt in the last few years, when as a family we start to reminisce, that my memories of the past are not always the same as everyone else's.  A case in point is the story of how and when we got our first colour television.  This is the way I remember it.  It was 1973 and Princess Anne was due to get married on November 14th, Mum was expecting Tricia and she wanted to be able to watch the wedding in colour so.... we got a colour TV.  The irony was that Tricia was a very late baby and Mum was in hospital and had to watch it on a black and white set with the rest of the new Mums.  Now if you ask my Dad or my Brother about this, they will tell you a completely different story (which I can't remember no matter how many times I'm told as my version is completely ingrained in my mind).

So when I tell you stories from the past, they may or may not be correct but what the heck, it's how I remember stuff!

When I was born, we lived in a flat on Lincoln Road which I don't remember at all, and then we moved to a house on Windsor Close which I do remember a little.  My brother was born when we lived there, which is also fixed in my memory.  I thought he was very clever you see, because he brought with him a present for me, a little patent handbag with fur on one side...which I'd had my eye on for a while.  How did he know? On this basis alone I decided he could stay.  I don't know if he knows how close he came to being returned to sender but the handbag saved him, and fortunately it proved to be a wise decision.

Another memory problem, is when you are told a story from your childhood so many times, you think you remember it.  My Grandad used to tell me that once when he took me to the park, I got my head stuck in the railings so he went home with a duck under his arm instead.  Now while this is a very amusing story (except perhaps for the poor duck who was just quacking along minding it's own business) and I sort of feel like I half remember it, this can't possibly be true...can it?  I'll have to enquire about that....Hmmm!


Grandad also told me that when I was very little and in my playpen, I shuffled the whole thing over to the window ledge, reached up and pulled his tobacco pouch down and started to eat the contents.  I can only imagine the look on my face when they found me!


Another event that is so clear in my mind it could have been yesterday, happened when I was about nine and my brother was six.  We were playing behind the settee where Dad kept the enormous barrel of beer he was brewing - I'm sure the next bit is different in my brother's memory - but the way I recall it, he climbed up onto the big plastic barrel and over it went... oh dear, the living room was awash with half brewed beer and hoo ha ensued.  We were both banished to our rooms for the rest of our lives.  My brother was actually paroled for the afternoon to go to his best friends birthday party because it would have been unfair on his friend....  never been sure about that one.  Mind you it might have all been my fault in the first place, I probably egged him on to climb that beer barrel mountain.  I've conveniently forgotten that bit.