Autobiographical memory.......or the lack of it.

Foggy this morning!

Not the type that is muffling or eerie. Not the type that asthmatics fear. Not dirty or threatening, the stuff of "B" rated movies. Rather lying in green hollows, light and fluffy, laying diamonds in the grass as the dawn light reaches out. Cool and damp but soon to disappear, like it had never been, as the sun rises and burns it off.

Wet enough to hold all the good, new smells as Sam trots along nose in the grass. The canine equivalent of reading the morning newspaper. Who was here? Who has passed during the night?

Golfers striding off from the first tee leaving tracks in the grass soon to be obliterated as the sun slowly rises seemingly out of the clubhouse roof.

The precursor of another beautiful day.

It reminds me........but there we go. This notion of memory. The extent to which all our senses are evocative. How sights, sounds, smells, taste and touch all evoke memories. How suddenly the forefronts of our minds are flooded with images, not necessarily pictorial, of things or events long past.

Why are we the way we are? Why do we behave the way we do? Is it genetic? Perhaps, perhaps not. Are we a product of our environment? For me, at least, absolutely. Directly and indirectly.

Hmmm I see a very large and very wriggly can of worms opening up before me. Frankly not just "opening up." It's been "open" for a number of years now as I struggle with the memory of an environment of which I am a product. (Frankly !! )

I suppose, by most standards, I am a reasonably educated individual but most certainly not in the fields that encompass memory. What I find interesting is that these fields have changed over the last few decades as our knowledge expands. Changed ? Perhaps not. Rather they have, evolved, become more specific however, having said that, they have drastically changed from the notions of ages past......or have they?

A description of memory could be as follows:

In psychology, memory is an organism's mental ability to store, retain and recall information. Traditional studies of memory began in the fields of philosophy, including techniques of artificially enhancing the memory. The late nineteenth and early twentieth century put memory within the paradigms of cognitive psychology. In recent decades, it has become one of the principal pillars of a branch of science called cognitive neuroscience, an interdisciplinary link between cognitive psychology and neuroscience.

As I delved more into the subject the more I became aware of the extent to which many paradigms are inconclusive although mostly in those areas of the non-physical. It's only in recent times that students have become aware of the connection between physical and non- physical giving rise to the "crossover" discipline of cognitive neuroscience.

Does this bore me? You're darn right!! Yet only because I have many interests that leave little room for it. What I do know is that there are things/events in my past that, you would think, I should be able to remember and I can't. Events that served to shape me; in that I believe that behaviour is a learned experience and that the more we understand that experience the better we can understand our behaviour. For that we need to be able to remember!! Full circle!!

Am I different from anyone else? Nope....not really....but is that really true? I know many people who have far better recall of events long past than I but there you go.......a product of our environment. So we're all the same!

Behaviour is just that. Not necessarily good or bad just behaviour. An action or a reaction. Acceptable or not acceptable but impacted by the recipients experience and subsequent behaviour. Wheels within wheels.

Leaves one to believe that in a successful relationship not only do you need to understand the "why's" of your own behaviour but those of your partner or associate also. A tall order indeed.

A scholar claims that memory is a phenomenon directly related to the present; our perception of the past is always influenced by the present, which means that it is always changing. More wheels!

It gets worse!

Crucial in understanding memory is the distinction between memory and history. Simply put, memories are the events that actually happened, while histories are subjective representations by the historian. In our personal lives these historians are close relatives. Parents, Grandparents, uncles, aunts or people simply close to you. All very subjective in the telling.

Even more wheels. No wonder it's so hard!!

However it serves to underline the importance of autobiographical memory in us in order to better understand our behaviour. Get it? Yea right. Easy? Yea right.

Memory is constructive. Block by block. The problem is that memories and the ability to recall differ for different periods of our lives. The periods being infantile, adolescent and adult. The vaguest of these being the infantile. Studies have proven that in the majority of instances people recall few personal events in the first five years of their lives. It is referred to as infantile amnesia. (It's an interesting topic and there's tons of reading available to you.)

Sooooo.....back to me!

The first five years of my life were probably the most traumatic of my life. The problem is I don't remember!! I used to think this was an issue peculiar to me. Now I know better!

I was a war baby with everything that entailed! My father was away on active service for most of the war. Must have had a huge and ongoing effect on my mother who would have been , of course, my prime source of emotional information.

I don't remember VE day although it was well within my cognitive experience. I don't remember my father coming "home." Although one would think that would be a major event in my life. I don't remember my brother being born but I do remember the winter of 47. Ain't life weird.

Classical music reminds me of my mother sitting at her piano lost in Mozart or Lizt. She was a concert pianist in her youth.

Adagio reminds me of my younger brother. Gone now.

Wet leather reminds me of my dad. Heading out at 4.30 in the morning. Fishing, ferreting, shooting. Feeling sick in the back of the car. The air a mixture of gun oil, damp leather, pipe smoke. I can smell it now.

The sound of wind evokes memories of the Yorkshire Moors. Wheeling curlews. The silence broken by the bleating of a lost lamb. The landscape crisscrossed by dry stone walls and becks you can hear down in the valley.

Mist reminds me of the West Coast. Leaving the dock before it's light. Visibility down to 50 yards. Eyes glued to the radar as it's a difficult exit by Whiffen Spit.

Church bells remind me of the old country.

Bigotry reminds me off a grandfather.

Contentment reminds me of another grandfather.

Alzheimers remind me of an uncle. He died not knowing where he was or who was there.

Hmmmmmmm.

Why do I love potato pancakes and hate tripe?

Why are some of us passionate and some not?

Why can some of us move on and some not?

Anabelle (another story) was money well spent.Her real name was Mary Trokenberg. I prefer Anabelle.

She caused me to look where I hadn't looked before. To question what I hadn't questioned before. She demanded honesty. She insisted on communication. The type of dialogue that bared past experience which, in turn and block by block, exposed memories giving rise to better understanding my behaviour.

Now where was I?