Some People Try Not To Think About These Things

I've had some Really Strange Experiences in my life that I've told no one about. And others I've shared, but which were not entirely believed. No matter. It's about time I got some of this stuff off my chest. I feel certain other people have had similar experiences; there must be.

Here's the first and least strange experience. When I was five years old, I lost my memory. I woke up one morning, the sun was shining, the birds were singing, but I knew right away something was wrong.

I couldn't remember the night before, the day before; I couldn't remember anything that had happened to me before that morning. I knew who I was and where I was. I was only missing "experiential" memory. That term is interesting - I'll explain in a moment.

I could hear my family in the kitchen. I could smell breakfast cooking. I was the last up. I got up to go join them, but never told them about the memory loss. Not for about forty years.

That probably seems odd, but I had an odd upbringing. My father was emotionally abusive. He bullied and belittled all of us, including my mother. He frightened us into keeping our heads down and our mouths shut. So keeping thoughts to myself became second nature.

I never got those memories back. Okay, there wasn't much to recall, anyway, I know. But it's sad that something made me block out my memories like that. I don't want to know what it was. It's probably more unpleasant than the memory loss, so I'd rather not know.

But I did have a flash of memory in a dream when I was a teenager. My mother was able to confirm it was probably a true memory. I saw two boys, African American, about 8 and 12 years old. They were just standing together and looking at me. There was a wall behind them; the side of a house. I could see a residential street to the side. It's an odd memory because there was nothing happening and I didn't feel anything special about it. But what was interesting was that I had to look UP at those boys. I was very small. My mother confirmed there were brothers like that living next to us when I was little. And the street looked like those I remember in South Central Los Angeles, where we lived until I was three.

The reason I said this experiential memory loss was interesting is that I read that term in a book and only much later realized it applied to me. I had read it without making the connection. In fact, I thought the term was made up and probably just an idea some writer came up with as a plot device.

The book I'm talking about is Leonard Nimoy's autobiographical "I Am Spock". He mentions that Spock lost his "experiential" memory after dying in Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan. It was strange recognizing that this silly-sounding "plot device" described what happened to me.

One other thing. I did try to mention this when I was six years old. It had been on my mind a lot. So when my first-grade teacher asked the class, "Why is the number five odd?" my mind went right to it. I raised my hand and started to say that when I was five years old, I felt very odd. Of course, the teacher was trying to explain odd and even numbers, so she interrupted me and I never brought it up again. But I kept wondering about it. It's too bad no one listens to little kids.