Xuen Tey - Week #13 - Remembering

Memory is a tricksy concept. Memories are what shape who we are as individuals, our personalities and hobbies, but they are also things that are easily lost or forgotten. Which memories will stay with one forever and which are whisked away on the rivers of the past is a toss-up, a random choice made by our brains. Technically, there probably is a pattern to the choice, but my memory has always been an unreliable and spotty entity. 

My childhood memories have always been especially varied compared to my memories of my high school and junior high years. While on one hand, I vividly remember good moments from my field trip in 5th grade, I also remember a random day where all I did was joke about acronyms with my friends. My recollections of childhood aren’t quite a proper picture, moreso a collection of various puzzle pieces where quite a few are missing. Out of all the pieces that are there, only some I vividly recall, while other pieces are more like vague summaries of what occurred, with me having no recollection of the exact details. 

Despite this aspect of my own memory, when I’ve asked others about their childhood memories, they seem to have even less memories than me. One of my friends told me she has close to no recollections of her elementary school days, so I wonder if my memory is better than I think it is, or simply that my friend didn’t find elementary school days interesting enough to remember. My theory in reference to this is that strange or interesting events are more likely to stick around in one’s memory because of their abnormality, and since my childhood memories are bursting to full with unusual events, I have a better recollection in contrast to my friends, who have said they had rather average childhoods.