Simple memories of an earlier life.

[Germonico]

I recall this time of year as a youth when I would go out to the garden as requested, pick tomatoes, and Mother would make Bacon, Lettuce & Tomato Sandwiches for lunch. I never cared for fresh tomatoes, so I just had a bacon sandwich. I rarely buy bacon, but I did last week on a whim and just finished a bacon sandwich spread with peanut butter. It is as if a "memory" chemical was released in my brain and I am sitting here relishing fond memories of my childhood. What triggers memories of your childhood? Discuss:

 

[braumeister]

Dipping a madeleine in a cup of tea. Oh, the memories!

 

[Meadbh]

Jacobs Cream Crackers with cheddar cheese and tomatoes, and Barry's Gold Label loose leaf tea.

 

[kcowan]

PB&J on white bread stuffed in a reused paper bag for lunch.

Pot roast of beef cooked over roast potatoes with peas. On Sunday's.

 

[JoeWras]

Music. Anything top 40 playing from '69 to '71 throws me right back to carefree summers, school, learning to read, etc.

The smell of paper, crayons and clay. There's a closet at church, that, when opened, transports me directly to 2nd grade. This closet has the sunday school supplies. The smell is a wormhole to age 8.

 

[Blue Collar Guy]

OMG, thank you a million times for this thread. I was lamenting childhood memories lately. My mom is in bad shape, Dad is long long gone as well as one of my 3 sisters. I get daily triggers for memories mostly food(my life always revolved around it). Old TV movies from the 40's -60's, thats how my house was run.

 

[6miths]

Many things thankfully. Was a wonderful time. I have a pouch of Amphora Brown pipe tobacco that I bought maybe 15 years ago that I keep in my bedside table drawer at the cottage. One whiff of it evokes great memories of my father. Sadly tobacco probably contributed to his passing at least a few years earlier than he otherwise would have.

 

[Scrapr]

Mom usually picked strawberries w/us 4 kids. We did it to "earn" school clothes. She always made some strawberry jam. After the kids were out on their own she stocked us up with Tupperware containers. Mom & Dad are both in memory care now. She hasn't done jam for probably 5 or 6 years. I finished the last container a month ago. That jam always took me back to fun times in the strawberry fields

 

[Amethyst]

When I was a teenage girl, I loved a perfume called Estee Lauder's Youth-Dew. My sister kidded me that it was for old ladies, which, as a powdery, floral scent, it probably was. But for my "expensive gift" one Christmas I begged for a fancy little compact with gel perfume inside. Amazingly, I got it.

I still have it, and when I pull it out now and then and have a sniff, I recall going on those fun teen dates where the two of you race to see who can finish the pizza fastest.

 

[Moemg]

The thing that does it for me is Jean Nate splash . In the summer we used to keep a bottle in the fridge to splash on on hot days .

 

[Amethyst]

Yes! It smells just like limoncello!

The thing that does it for me is Jean Nate splash . In the summer we used to keep a bottle in the fridge to splash on on hot days .

 

[rodi]

I think I'd rather have the limoncello in the fridge (ok freezer) than Jean Nate. LOL

 

[rodi]

Interesting thread. My husband was cooking the sauce for a lasagna this morning - so sauteing onions, garlic, thyme etc... He learned the recipe basics from his Sicilian grandparents. At the same time our piano teacher was here giving piano lessons. She's from Brazil but her parents were from Sicily. She commented that it reminded her so much of the smells of her mother cooking.

For me some of the "triggers" of childhood memories:
- Any coconut based sunscreen.... Spent a lot of time at the beach and in the pool as a kid - and that's what every sunscreen smelled like.
- grilled cheese and soup for lunch... that was a special treat mom used to make for us on cooler days.
- The sounds of kids playing sports in the middle of the street on summer evenings. It's been a few years now that we have enough kids on our long dead end street for this to happen... Happened all the time when I was a kid... It meant summertime!!! (I live in the house I grew up in.)

 

[Blue Collar Guy]

When I was a teenage girl, I loved a perfume called Estee Lauder's Youth-Dew. My sister kidded me that it was for old ladies, which, as a powdery, floral scent, it probably was. But for my "expensive gift" one Christmas I begged for a fancy little compact with gel perfume inside. Amazingly, I got it.

I still have it, and when I pull it out now and then and have a sniff, I recall going on those fun teen dates where the two of you race to see who can finish the pizza fastest.

I had an Uncle that worked during the Christmas rush at the Estee Lauder plant in long island. He once gave my 3 sisters rings that had a solid perfume in them. They were very 60's tie dyed psychedelic colors, thanks for the memory

 

[MRG]

I'd go with my DF to the garden. He's bring a salt shaker and a knife. The fresh tomatoes were awesome. He always peeled them, I still do today.

Thanks for the thread.

 

[GrayHare]

I can't hear Hotel California without being transported back to the bus on which a passenger was playing that song via portable radio, this on one glorious late spring afternoon while heading home after the final day of school.

 

[Ready]

Eating a big plate of whole belly Ipswich fried clams.

 

[Dancfo]

I didn't like tomatoes either, so I'd have a BL with mayonnaise on toast. Aside from a few dinners mom would make, I distinctly remember my father making Ritz crackers with cream cheese and olives (green with pimentos) as a snack when he came from work that we'd share. He'd have a beer - I wouldn't - probably because I was about 10. But, when I'd get a beer out of the fridge for him and would pour it, I'd put a big head on it and drink the foam off the top.

 

[socca]

For some reason the Maria Muldaur song Midnight at the Oasis sends me back to the bedroom of my childhood home. I was 12 years old when this song was released.

 

[aja8888]

Eating baloney sandwich on white bread with mayo. (not really dome much anymore though)

When I was about 12 or 13, I would make myself a few of these on Saturday and watch Yankee baseball games on our small black and white TV set in Connecticut. I am still a diehard Yankee fan.

 

[Walt34]

Freshly fried chicken, I mean right out of the fryer, placed on paper towels for a few minutes and then to the plate, still too hot to touch. We didn't have much money when I was growing up so steaks were a rarity. But on Fridays Mom would cook the best-ever fried chicken with an electric countertop electric fryer. At the time I didn't appreciate how much work that was on her part.

 

[Bamaman]

When driving home from downtown in our mid size southern city, we'd pass a barbeque restaurant that was cooking pork shoulders over smoldering hickory wood. They had huge exhaust fans, and you could smell the barbeque a mile away.

The smell would just make us so hungry.

 

[Ronstar]

Drinking water from a tin cup at my grandparents hand pump well.

 

[FlaGator]

Drinking spring water from a pipe someone had jammed into rocks along the road near the Los Pinos River NE of Durango CO around 66-67. Went back 20+ years later and water was still flowing from the pipe

 

[marko]

We now live in what was my grandparents' house. Every so often I can 'see' myself pulling my brother's snow boots off as he sat on the basement steps; I pulled a little too hard and he went flying off the steps onto the cement floor.