We say we don’t remember the early years of our life. I think that we actually do, but our memories from that time have such a different quality from other memories that we don’t recognise them as memories. In fact, far from being lost, they are so all-pervasive that we tend to see them as just the way things are.
Cosmic Background Radiation is a kind of hum or glow of microwaves that comes from every part of the sky. It’s not a star or a galaxy or a quasar or some other object that can be located in a particular place. The astronomers who discovered it, back in the sixties, thought at first that it might be a fault in their equipment, interference from some terrestrial source perhaps. They even considered the possibility that it might be caused by pigeons nesting on the receiver. But they eventually concluded that what it was was nothing less the aftermath of the Big Bang. The further away astronomers look, the further back in time they are seeing. And the radiation behind everything else comes from the very beginning.
I think that’s a pretty decent metaphor for the character of early memories.
If you want to learn more about the first few years of your own life, it’s no good looking for details of particular events – those sorts of memories just weren’t being laid down – but look for a pervasive mood, a set and fears and longings, that are always there somewhere in the background of everything else, and which, for better or worse, have shaped the rest of your life.
