I’m not sure what my earliest memory is, but I have it narrowed down to two candidates. Both occurred while I was around two years old.
Candidate One
At the time my family was living on base in Virginia Beach. My parents were going to some party, and I was left with my older brothers. They are six and eight years older than me, and loved a bit of the torture for their younger bro.
It was a stormy night, and they had been telling me stories about the Boogey Man. I was in a nasty fright, jumping at shadows and thunder.
I’m not sure which came up with the idea, but they decided to shove me outside the house and lock the door. I was standing out in the rain, scared half-crazy, and they were shouting taunts out at me.
“Watch out for the Boogey Man!”
“He likes to eat little boys!”
“He only comes out at night when it’s raining!”
“What’s that behind you? Run!!!”
Bastards.
Candidate Two
My family liked to spend Sunday afternoons playing tennis. My father, mother, and two brothers would ride their bikes to the courts on the base and have a time of it. I was too young to ride a bike, so my father had a kiddy seat on the back of his.
This seat was pretty ok. I enjoyed the rides. I was getting to see the wide world in a manner that was prohibited to me otherwise. The seat had these leg-thingies that ended in platforms for my feet, which were strapped in.
One day while riding back from tennis, I remember looking down and noticing that the strap on my left foot was broken, and that my foot was just swaying in the wind.
I remember quite clearly wondering what would happen if my foot were to go into the spokes of the rear wheel. I remember thinking it would be a bad thing, and that I should avoid it. Now I didn’t know that the spokes were called spokes, and probably not that the wheel was called a wheel, but you get the picture.
So here I am, back of my father’s bike, enjoying the breeze and the scenery. My thoughts of a few moments earlier were totally forgotten. When it happened.
My foot did indeed enter the spokes of the wheel, which cut the flesh and tendons around my ankle. My parents rushed me to the base hospital, where the doctors discovered that the only thing connecting my foot to my leg were the bone and a few tatters of flesh.
I remember lying on a steel examination table. And that is the last thing I remember of that experience.