I was recently told by a friend that she attended a writing class and the exercise they did was each person had to finish the sentence, “I remember when….”. She told a funny story of when she was thirteen. Since our conversation I have been playing the “I remember when…” game with myself regularly. I give myself some parameters, like an age range, topic or location and see what is brought to mind.
Here are a few from when I was young:
“I remember when I was 10 and I lived on the 29th floor of an apartment building, and my friend lived in the apartment building across the courtyard. At night, at a designated time, we would flash signals to each other with flashlights from our windows.”
“I remember when I was in Florida as a child with my grandparents and we left the movie theater one night and the sky had the most magnificent pink and purples dancing in the sky as the sun was setting.”
“I remember when I used to go to my friend’s house for lunch and we would have bologna sandwiches on toasted bread.”
I spend a lot of time practicing being in the moment and present to what is in front of me, but it is fun on occasion to see what memories surface when you invite them. How would you finish the sentence, “I remember when…”?
