Just Because You Remember It, Is It True?

Over thirty plus summers ago my folks took my sister and I to the Safari Park for the day.

Like most of these places you drive around the park and then you eventually get out the car to get up close and personal with other animals, the ones that don’t have a natural instinct to eat you.

Lions, tigers and bears…oh my. 

It was a scary and scarring day.

The park was school holiday busy and I remember my sister had just stopped crying due to a giraffes attempt to eat her plastic strawberry hair bobbles popping out from her under her neat ribbons, which I had found very funny and couldn’t stop laughing about.

Then.

Smile wiped.

I remember a massive commotion. I remember staff rushing about. Lions had escaped and were coming our way. I remember being put in a small cage as everything was brought under control. I remember being with boy about my age and my folks saying, ‘stay there, it’s just for a little while’.

I remember them leaving me, the boy screaming and then the lions. I remember being terrified and the people that cared for me had gone, taking their first born with ribbons in her hair with them.

Me? Caged for four hours.

Here’s the thing…

That memory?

All. A. Pack. Of. Lies.

Well, more a little mix up between reality and imagination. How it got in there I have no idea, it was real for me for nearly thirty-five years until one day I went to visit my folks.

I had been running a group that day and I told them, ”That horrible trip to the Safari Park came up today…’ and on I went reminding them about the scary experience I thought we had all shared as a family.

The room hushed, I looked up from dinner and I caught my Mum and Dad doing that parental eye thing they do with one another, which basically means, ‘What the hell is she talking about now?’

Eventually my Dad caught up.

Thank you Dad.

But he remembers it a tad differently.

Apparently…

A wolf was being moved to a different part of the park. Apparently the staff asked if we would stand behind metal barriers. Apparently I was lifted up and placed behind the barriers for safety because I was little. Apparently my folks were behind me, holding me back from going to pet the wolf because I was so excited. Apparently the boy beside me was crying, but not (according to the Memory of Dad Archie) at the wolf. He’d dropped an ice cream and he ‘wasn’t getting another one’ which caused a right old scene. The wolf was tame, and some of the older children were allowed to say nip up and say hello. It was over in five minutes.

My Dad then said, ‘we should’ve kept quiet and we would have heard how you saved the boy and wrestled the crocodiles in a few years time’.

I have ceased with the story. Well, it’s become this one instead.

Oh, how we chortled.

Then my dad said, ‘What else have we done to screw your life up, any other memories in there that need reviewed?’

Um.

Well.

What about the day I fell into the canal and nearly drowned?

Dad: It was a puddle beside the canal, and the dog pushed you over, you fell in the puddle nose first.

Feck.

Up all these stories came. And the explanation of what really happened (unless they are lying to me now, no surely not). Parents? I know you stalk this website.

We both know that memories can become distorted and mixed up.

We both know that we can create different memories to what actually happened.

We both know that memories are changed every time we think about them.

Ever been dumped or ended a not so hot relationship, at the time of the experience both of you shared 50/50 in all that went on and when it finished you re-wrote the memories? Well, that didn’t go according to my rules, maps, script and view of the world, therefore I will use my incredibly powerful imagination to do a little bit of a re-write so I can put 100% of the blame on them. There we go. That’s better. Now, who can I tell the new story to?  

Our imagination is a wonderful place to play in.

It can also be a place where we create legends, myths and hearsay.

Just because we are remembering, doesn’t mean to say it’s true.

Here’s an idea, maybe when you’re playing over a memory, it might be worth you raising your own eyebrow and asking yourself, ‘does this need reviewed now?’ Question it with ‘is this the truth, or is this the truth as I perceive it to be’? 

What freedom.

“Just because  I remember it, is it true?”