Jeff's Earliest Memories

Stephanie's family is gathering a collection of "earliest memories" for her parent's Christmas gift.  Thought you might be interested in mine.

Adrenaline not only adds to heightened awareness, it also increases your long-term memory. I guess that's why I remember some events from June 5th, 1976 so vividly. 

I remember parts of my little body being cold, my nose, my hands when I moved them, and my toes. I had a hooded sweatshirt on, and was lying in the back of our pickup somewhere. Excited, as a two-but-nearly three year old, I eagerly popped up out from the sleeping bag, and stood up in the cold air of our pickup's camper shell. I remember looking through the glass of the camper shell, blurred by condensation and seeing the deep green of the trees outside and the the ice blue morning sky. I'm sure I said something to my sleepy parents about waking up, but don't recall much after that. I'm guessing they grumbled something about me needing to go back to sleep...

The next thing I remember was holding someone's hand - could have been Mom or Dad. We were walking around the corner of our house to the "back door" (actually on the side). I remember the door being opened, and looking down the stairs from ground level into the basement. The blue-green carpet of the stairs was all dark and wet, and as my eyes drifted down the stairs, I could see that there was water standing about half-way down. I distinctly recall feeling how distraught my parents were. I wanted them to not be sad. I looked carefully and saw the monkey from my Fisher-Price circus train set firmly gripping the brass handrail wall mount.

"Look!" I said to my parents. "It's okay - my monkey's still here!"

Those are some of my earliest memories, the morning of the Teton Dam breaking, and coming into town with my parents unaware of the devastation that had visited our home while we were away. Writing this now, and thinking that Eleanor is just about the same age as I was then, I marvel to think how old I felt at the time. In my memory I certainly didn't feel like a toddler. I really felt like if they saw the monkey they would realize that everything would be okay.

Actually my first bona fide memory (that I can recall) is sitting in a swing downstairs with Marshall next to me. (Apparently it was a wide hall). I was strapped into the swing chair seat, and couldn't get out, and it had stopped swinging. I could see the light coming in the window in front of me, frosted with steam. I could also hear the shower running.

But that's not very exciting. And I'm sure I was yelling something like Mommmmmieeeeeee! I'm stuck!

As Stephanie would say - "you gotta shower sometime".