Triggering Sensory Memories

Quick, what’s your favorite childhood memory? Write it down in as much detail as you can remember and then come back and finish reading this column.

Without pause or hesitation, I can say my all time best childhood memory is the week long horseback riding camp my folks sent me to the summer I turned nine. At that point I had been horse crazy for years and a whole week spent riding, grooming and even cleaning up after those beautiful animals made me happier than I had ever been. Over the 39 years since that week at River Farms the memories had dimmed, still bright enough to bring a smile to my face, but the power, the meat of those experiences, seemingly had slipped away.

That is until a couple of weeks ago, when, thanks to my granddaughter’s love of animals and interest in horses, I found myself back at a stable making arrangements for HER summer riding camp. Petting the horses, helping her pick out a pair of riding boots, even the smell of the horse manure began a trickle, and then a flood of memories and emotions that blew the door of my mental vault open like Katrina through a sandcastle. Not only did the details and the sensory memories come rushing back, but they had so much depth and texture I felt that I could actually touch that nine year old girl’s heart again. Suddenly, I knew what she was thinking and feeling and dreaming like I had always had access to her. As a human it was an amazing experience, but as a writer, it was magical. It was the missing piece I always felt existed in my children’s writing, that authenticity, that child’s heart, that always seemed to elude me when I tried to reach back to it.

I can’t guarantee of course, that this type of experience will do for you what it did for me, but I believe it’s certainly worth a shot. At worst, reliving or at least reinvestigating, a favorite childhood recollection will provide some solid research, or jog your memory for details or situations you can put in your writer’s bank. At best, it may heal a hole in your writing and perhaps even in your heart.