Checkbook Memories

Some memories fade in detail but remain in feeling

This week’s brain waves are about the good memories in our lives that we can still physically feel. The specific details of those memories may not all be there anymore, but the feeling of that moment in time can be relived over and over again. A photo from what feels like a lifetime ago—where the memory itself is foggy—can still spark a curl of a smile, a moment of reminiscence, and joy.

I was talking with two students of mine at Equinox Domino after class. One had just returned from a fantastic trip to see the Sequoia trees in Yosemite National Park. It sounded like the trip of a lifetime and such an incredible experience. She showed me a photo of herself standing in front of one of the Sequoias. Breathtaking even through a picture- I could only imagine what it felt like in real life.

She asked if I had ever been. I smiled and said no. But my mother’s checkbook used to have a faded photo of the Yosemite Sequoia forest in the background. Her friend smiled and said, “Wow, what a solid core childhood memory. My father’s checkbook had butterflies on it, and I was absolutely obsessed with it.”

Childhood core memories. We often think of them as things that were positively created for us. But they are also certainly things we can build for ourselves.

I grew up on a lot of land for a property that was not a farm. Behind our house was a giant field, and surrounding areas were uncleared woods. I remember going through my mother’s scarf drawer- not winter scarves, but the silk and satin scarves you’d wear around your neck to complete an outfit as a professional woman in the ‘80s and ‘90s.