Narratives

How much of our personal narrative originates from other people’s memories?

What’s something about yourself that’s always been true? I mean the type of thing you can trace back to your childhood. Where, for as long as you can remember, your mom told you, "Even when you were a baby, you loved food and would try anything once."

That’s one of mine, actually. My mom says that I always loved to eat and could absolutely crush a full plate. It’s inevitable that whenever I tell her about taking Violet out to restaurants, she repeats the same story, as if it’s the first time I’ve heard it: they’d take toddler-me out to eat, and I’d eat so fast and so much, the servers would return to the table and look suspiciously at her and my dad, as if they’d eaten all my food before I had a chance to get at it. True story!

Or is it?

Because motherhood has made me realize how much of our personal narrative comes from the perspective of other people's memories of us.