I've always had a bit of a temper. Liable to get into a strop at a perceived injustice even before I knew what justice was. Which probably explains my earliest memory. If it is a memory that is.
The ingredients are a window, a cot, a blanket, an enamel pail, a door, my parents and a poo. I'd just performed in my nappy and it was really very pleasant. Satisfying, warm, soft and good to have got rid of. I could see my mother at the bottom of my cot and about to change me only she didn't. My father came in and suddenly she was talking to him. After a while my poo got chilly and a bit wet and nasty to be lying in. I began to cry but nobody paid attention. I cried louder. No response. I got angry and gave it more wellie. Quite a lot more. Why was I having to wait ? She'd been all set to go. My strop gained momentum. All the attention was on my father. What about me ? ME ! ME ! ME ! But I was ignored. How could I be ? Were they deaf ? I was incandescent with rage, roaring like a bull, ready to burst a blood vessel. And that's where the memory ends. If it is a memory that is. Because the cot was around until I was five as was the blanket and the pail. The window no. The window blew in during the Clydebank Blitz. My mother described how she and my father had rushed down to their little cubbyhole under the stairs with their ration books, gas masks and identity cards then realised they'd forgotten the baby. They raced back upstairs to their flat and fortunately got me before any bombs fell. So I knew about the window and I knew my cot had been in front of it.
Years later I told my mother about this memory but it meant nothing. I was always pooing in my nappy and screaming to have it changed. But she admitted it was strange. I had placed the cot correctly. In front of the window but set back from it. And the door was right too. Behind on the left. And the pail. Underneath the cot bottom right. Not things I'd been told.
Children don't remember things before three of four they say. So is this a real memory ? And if so why remember such an ordinary incident ? Or why invent something so mundane. I don't remember my thoughts. They are guesswork. It's the emotion, my rage and the attention focused on me being taken away. That's what's stuck. The injustice of it.
By the time I had other memories the room and the window no longer existed. I was living miles away in the country in a wooden hut. I could walk and talk and didn't roar like a bull any more although I cried from time to time. My anger over injustice was still there but mostly my tears were for skinned knees.