This is the first part of a series on Autobiographical Memory in Third Culture Kids: exploring how our unique global childhood experiences shapes our memories differently from mono-cultural experiences.
Have you ever heard a song and suddenly been transported back to a specific event, time, or feeling? For me, Moves Like Jagger makes me think of my best friend from college because that song always got stuck in her head, and we would sing it together.
What about a smell?
Yesterday, my husband built a fire in our wood stove and used pine... which immediately made me think of my grandparents' house in New Mexico when I was little.
An activity?
Making a certain gingerbread recipe takes me back to the week after my son was born, when I first made that particular recipe, which was in a magazine my grandmother had brought me.
An object?
I have a leopard cowrie sea shell which is half covered with calcium deposits and half eaten away by vinegar, which reminds me strongly of a particular morning when I was about 10, living on a boat in the South Pacific, and I learned a wonderful lesson about controlling my temper when things don't turn out the way I want them to, and about how my dad supports me even when I lose it.
Have you ever wondered what would happen if you were never exposed to these "memory triggers"? Why do we reminisce? Why do we remember our past? Usually because something triggers that memory. Without memory triggers, we have very little likelihood of remembering the past, especially with the kind of vivid detail that comes when the memory is triggered by a sound, smell, or sight.
BUT: I grew up in Fiji. On the other side of the world. The smell of the ocean, the taste of a fresh tropical coconut, the sound of worship songs in that island tongue, the sight of the sunrise out of sight of land... those memory triggers are all (unless I return for a visit) completely absent from my day-to-day life. As a result, I live most of the time without childhood memory triggers.
I think this hit me the strongest when I was helping my (then) boyfriend (now husband) clean out his childhood room so his parents could move. He took forever to pack everything up, stopping to reminisce over every. little. thing. -- and I found myself getting angry. Not angry at him for taking so long -- no. Angry that he had memories. That he could remember. I had just as much childhood to remember as he did -- but no way to access or bring up thoses memories! My childhood toys were scattered across the globe, shed as too much weight to carry in a suitcase across the ocean. I didn't have the luxury of a room full of 20 years worth of childhood clutter. And I missed it. I missed that feeling that I knew existed but didn't experience. I missed picking up an object of no worth to anyone but myself, and letting myself be carried away into a memory of the past.
An old straw hat became a story about his grandfather. A box of ratty old feathers was a testament to his "fly fishing stage." A pair of holey pants was a story about hand-me-downs and an inconsiderate older brother who wore a hole in pants before they were handed down. Every item in the room was a glimpse into who he was, a moment in time that had gone into making him the person I love.
And I didn't have anything to offer back. That evening, I realized that while he brought to me a rich history patchworked together with seemingly meaningless objects that grew into stories and moments and life ... I came, stranded in this moment, with nothing to trigger the memories I knew had to exist. I had led a childhood crazy with far-flung corners of the globe and rich with exotic spices, foreign tongues, and secluded beaches. And I had none of it -- no tangible evidence of the life I had lived. No objects or sounds or smells to trigger stories. And it is surprisingly hard to drag stories out of your head with no triggers to hook them with. I could recite the countries I had been to, but kept coming back to the same old stories -- the ones I had told on furlough, or for some other reason had cemented in my memory. No spontaneous moments of who I was as a child bubbled to the surface of my brain, and I felt, that evening, stranded: isolated in that moment in time, with nothing to offer of my past.
Now, of course, my feelings right then were an exaggeration. I did have pictures, and if I dug, I certainly had memories. But that overwhelming feeling of isolation from my past that occured when I was faced with someone who had many, many memory triggers, cause me to realize the amazing lack of memory triggers in my own life and in the lives of many TCKs, because the places, foods, sounds, smells, and everything else associated with our childhood experiences are, quite literally, a world away. And often, we know that except for the occasional visit, we will never go back.
I do have solutions to this particular issue, as well as more insights on the phenomenon of autobiographical memory in TCKs -- this rather sad note is certainly not my final word on the matter! No, this post is merely the introduction to a portion of the TCK experience that is close to my heart, and that I believe plays a starring in role in how we can care for "our very own TCKs."
Resources:
Retner, R. (August 5, 2010). Brain's Link Between Sounds, Smells, and Memory Revealed. Live Science. Retrieved from: http://www.livescience.com/8426-brain-link-sounds-smells-memory-revealed.html
Saive, A.L., Royet, J.P., Plailly, J. (2014). A review on the neural bases of episodic odor memory: from laboratory-based to autobiographical approaches. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, vol. 8 (issue 00240). Retrieved from: http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnbeh.2014.00240/full