From birth the world is completely new to us. We experience an onslaught of sights, sounds, sensations which startle us. It has to be very difficult for a baby because every waking moment they are essentially learning new things. Then, as toddlers, they start to learn to walk and assign words with objects. It is interesting that we do not have memories of our first moments of life or even of our first couple of years. It is apparent that the infant is learning things and this knowledge becomes subconscious actions in our adult life. We do not look directly into the sun, but at some point we did and it hurt our eyes. We learned from the painful experience and now we know not to look into the sun. However, learning is different than remembering; true, learning is a type of memorizing, but it is different than the remembering of places, people, and events. The lack of memories of our first birthday or the first time, as babies, we were taken to meet Aunt So-and-So differs from learning not to look at the sun. But why don't we remember all of our childhood? Maybe our brains are not completely formed as to be able to retain the details of everyday life. Or maybe they are too overwhelmed by the task of learning EVERYTHING that they do not have the space to commit details that are unnecessary for survival.
Personally, I have very few memories from before I was four. They are more like little bits and pieces with all of the specifics missing. The first house I lived in, my family moved from when I was three and the dog, Sandy, my dad had when I was born died when I was a little over two. I remember being in a little Fisher Price red car, that we had for years, in the backyard of that house and Sandy sticking her head in and me hugging her around the neck. But that is it, I don't remember what day it was, the time of day, or what the weather was like, or even who was watching me playing in the yard. These short, vague remembrances are my earliest memory. What is your first childhood memory and why can't you remember the rest?
