False Memories

[Mythopoeika]

Ok I think I’m going mad. I live near the Dartford Bridge and knew it was 30 years old this year. But I could swear that the stone at the front of it said July 1991. The picture attached proves it doesn’t. I think someone’s messed with my timeline.

It says 1991.

 

[MorningAngel]

FWIW ... This photo of the bridge's opening (dedication?) in October 1991 suggests the marker never mentioned a month at all.

View attachment 41741​

I’ve found someone on a local group that thought it said it too. I think I’ve found a Mandela effect where they finished it early and put the month on it.

 

[CharmerKamelion]

I think we ought to welcome MorningAngel to this reality from....... wherever it was you've just arrived from. Hopefully, all the other stuff will be mostly the same.

 

[Frideswide]

Finished, Open and The Opening can be at different dates. Hopefully Finished comes first but things get changed about after that.

People may be able to use a bridge or motorway or whatever before someone turns up to do the ribbon and speech bit.

 

[MorningAngel]

Finished, Open and The Opening can be at different dates. Hopefully Finished comes first but things get changed about after that.

People may be able to use a bridge or motorway or whatever before someone turns up to do the ribbon and speech bit.

True but I remember that actual sign saying July 1991.

 

[MorningAngel]

Interestingly I’ve just started writing a book about someone who finds themselves on a different timeline. But they can see ‘ghosts’ too although they aren’t ghosts she’s seeing normal people from the past and the future. I don’t fancy that bit.

 

[MorningAngel]

True but I remember that actual sign saying July 1991.

Maybe it’s connected to what happened in Loki

 

[IbisNibs]

Regardless of the actual month that was included on its sign in the alternative universe, I have to say that the sign (plinth?) itself it butt ugly and so is the bridge, from what I can see in the picture. It made me feel sorry for your poor Queen to have such a gray, clunky looking thing named for her! I suppose Parliament extinguished truly elegant aristocratic design.

 

[Cloudbusting]

Interestingly I’ve just started writing a book about someone who finds themselves on a different timeline. But they can see ‘ghosts’ too although they aren’t ghosts she’s seeing normal people from the past and the future. I don’t fancy that bit.

Perhaps you are seeing 'ghosts', but assume they're normal people... maybe WE are ghosts.

'I see dead forum folk...'

 

[Mr_Hermolle]

I've always loved Doctor Who - and ony of my earliest memories is watching the 4th Doctor Who story Pyramids Of Mars... - I was 3 and a 1/2 at the time. My one memory of this story is the Doctor falling into an upright sarcophagus - into a kind of vortex of psychedelic effects - I remember it being like brightly coloured concentric circles but in the shape of the sarcophagus (if you see what I mean). This memory stayed with me for years, and finally I got round to seeing the Pyramids of Mars on VHS tape when I was 16 in 1988... The Doctor falls into the sarcophagus, and instead of a concentric sarcophagus shaped tunnel, he falls into a kind of tunnel made of differently coloured oval shapes. In my memory the concentric circles go 'inwards' while in the real programme - the oval shapes go outwards. I've always been puzzled as to why my mind decided to change the original effects around so much.

 

[CharmerKamelion]

You have excellent taste, Mr_Hermolle, even if your memory isn't perfect! 'Pyramids of Mars' is a classy story and I remember it well, having been about 10 years older than you when it was first broadcast, and having watched it a few times since. It is quite understandable that your young mind re-formatted those special effects into an image of something that was drawing the Doctor into the space/time tunnel contained inside the sarcophagus. Must have been quite a startling image for a kid of that age!

I have many similar 'warped' memories of all kinds of TV shows, including examples from stuff like 'Thunderbirds' and 'Lost in Space' and many from 'Doctor Who' all through my childhood. I had a crystal clear memory of Jon Pertwee's 3rd Doctor being charged at by a unicorn - but the reality was it was Patrick Troughton's 2nd Doctor who faced being skewered on its horn (in 'The Mind Robber' shown in 1968, well over a year before Pertwee's first appearance as the Doctor).

I could give lots of other examples, but the one which stunned me most is from an episode of 'The Avengers' called 'The Fear Merchants' in which people are being assassinated by induced hallucinations involving their greatest fears. In one scene which seared itself into my young brain a character played by Brian Wilde (from 'Porridge' & 'Night of the Demon') is sitting in a chair and dies from terror after seeing a huge hairy spider descending towards him. I recall the spider as being a massive tarantula with its legs moving in a very menacing spidery fashion. The notion that it offed Mr Wilde just by him looking at it was probably what triggered my childhood arachnophobia! Many years later, the episode was repeated. I eagerly awaited the said scene, my by-now adult heart pumping a little faster in my chest. But when it came - WTF??? - it was a really cheap, plasticky, joke shop spider dangling stiffly on a piece of wire! The legs didn't move at all. My childhood brain had re-written that memory into something so much scarier than it really was. Says a lot about the power of a kid's imagination, and also about how cheap tv effects used to get away it !!

 

[escargot]

people are being assassinated by induced hallucinations involving their greatest fears.

The idea of torturing people by using their greatest fears pops up now and then in literature and drama. It happens to Winston Smith in 1984 when he has a cage of rats strapped to his face. The desired effect is achieved.

I too watched and learned from The Avengers as a kid. It has always been my belief that one's greatest fears should never be disclosed because they can be used against you.

Perhaps this notion came from that same episode!

 

[CharmerKamelion]

That's a very sensible (if borderline paranoid) attitude there, escargot. Perhaps I ought not to disclose on here that my greatest fear is being force fed marshmallows whilst wrapped tightly in bubblewrap, just in case some evil mastermind will decide to inflict that most terrifying of tortures on me.

Damn. Too late. I've said it. Oh well. Never mind.

 

[escargot]

That's a very sensible (if borderline paranoid) attitude

Not at all. When younger I saw fellow teenagers 'teased' by having spiders thrown in their faces or being shoved into lifts. Some threw up.
I wasn't having that.

Even adults try it. Bullies do like to exploit people's weaknesses. Stuff that.

The ex hated liver and the sight of it frightened him*. I'd have loved to send a truckload to his place after we divorced but he knew my fear too!

*He didn't fancy it at school but was forced to eat it and chucked up all over the place. Gave him a phobia!

 

[CharmerKamelion]

Actually, escargot, now you mention it.....

Showing my nervousness of crane flies/daddy longlegs when I was about 11 (yeah, ok, what a wuss!) was possibly not too wise a move. The school playing field was covered in them one September. My so-called friends had a field day - literally!

However, spending the whole lunch break pulling the spindly little critters out of my pullover and/or shirt, where my fellow pupils had thoughtfully deposited them, went a long way to curing my phobia. Whenever I see one now, I smile fondly at the memory and silently thank my class mates who clearly realised that facing one's fears is the best way to exorcise them. Kids can be so wise!

 

[escargot]

Actually, escargot, now you mention it.....

Showing my nervousness of crane flies/daddy longlegs when I was about 11 (yeah, ok, what a wuss!) was possibly not too wise a move. The school playing field was covered in them one September. My so-called friends had a field day - literally!

However, spending the whole lunch break pulling the spindly little critters out of my pullover and/or shirt, where my fellow pupils had thoughtfully deposited them, went a long way to curing my phobia. Whenever I see one now, I smile fondly at the memory and silently thank my class mates who clearly realised that facing one's fears is the best way to exorcise them. Kids can be so wise!

Interestingly, I have read that the late moors murderer Ian Brady had a fear of crane flies/daddy longlegs. The police were briefly tempted to lock him in a cell with some to 'encourage' co-operation.

We have a thread or two on phobias. On one I made the point that realising a phobia is a minor but essential part of my personality took the fear out them for me.

Like, if I'm faced with it and chuck up it's not the end of the world.

 

[CharmerKamelion]

Phobias and false memories link together in something which recently came up in passing while I was talking to my brother, who is 3 years older than me.

Our mother was Irish, and all through my life I have 'known' that we had only visited her parents in her home town in County Mayo on 2 occasions, once when I was aged about 3 (and I have a few clear memories of that visit) and once when I was about 9 (my memories of that visit are pin-sharp). Knowing this, I was astounded to hear my brother stating that we had visited several times in between those 2 occasions, in his words "we went over there at least 4 times" - meaning he 'knows' there were 2 occasions in between my remembered visits of which I have absolutely no recollection at all !!

When he came out with this tosh, I told him he was wrong - but it soon dawned on me that he's 3 years older than me, so I was on shaky ground. He even had detailed stories about one visit there when my dad came with us. I only ever recall it being the 2 of us plus our mum. All quite boggling to me. If I don't remember those other visits, what else has my brain deleted ???

The phobia connection is an incident that occurred whilst playing in puddles of sea water at a beach on the first visit when I was 3. I was happily splashing about in a pool with my bucket and spade when a huge hairy bumblebee (I recall it being about the size of a kitten) came swimming towards me, with its black spiky legs waggling helplessly in the air as it tried to get out of the pool. I think my mum and her sister must have thought my screams were an air raid siren or something, the way they came running. Even today if I see an insect of any type struggling in a swimming pool it makes me shudder.

 

[Sogna]

I have what must be a false memory of listening to a news broadcast of Winston Churchill’s funeral in January 1965 when I was about 18 months old. The memory is very clear that I knew who he was and what was happening, which seems very unlikely at that age.

 

[MorningAngel]

I have what must be a false memory of listening to a news broadcast of Winston Churchill’s funeral in January 1965 when I was about 18 months old. The memory is very clear that I knew who he was and what was happening, which seems very unlikely at that age.

Unless you have just been reincarnated.

 

[Sogna]

Unless you have just been reincarnated.

Interesting thought, there’s probably a short story there

 

[catseye]

I've also got 'false memories' linked to Doctor Who. I was firmly convinced that I saw the first Doctor, William Hartnell, regenerate into Patrick Troughton after being shot by a Dalek. Apparently he regenerated due to 'old age'. I've seen the actual 'regeneration' sequence since, but as they lost the episode in question, I can't vouch for the lead up. Except that The Tenth Planet is a cyberman story, rather than a Dalek story....

 

[gordonrutter]

I've also got 'false memories' linked to Doctor Who. I was firmly convinced that I saw the first Doctor, William Hartnell, regenerate into Patrick Troughton after being shot by a Dalek. Apparently he regenerated due to 'old age'. I've seen the actual 'regeneration' sequence since, but as they lost the episode in question, I can't vouch for the lead up. Except that The Tenth Planet is a cyberman story, rather than a Dalek story....

I can confirm he was not shot by anything prior to the regeneration.

 

[catseye]

I can confirm he was not shot by anything prior to the regeneration.

Yet I have a very clear memory, that I know to be false, of the Doctor walking, being shot by a Dalek and getting that X-ray effect, staggering into the Tardis, falling and regenerating. I was very young though, so I could have misunderstood or conflated several characters.

 

[catseye]

I wonder if persistent reading/hearing about something can give rise to a false memory? I had a friend who used to tell the story of the time we went to a nightclub and my tights fell down because the elastic waist gave way. She told it most amusingly - the only problem was that she wasn't there when it happened. She couldn't go with us that night and I was there with another friend (who also verified that first friend wasn't there). But she wouldn't have it and swore blind that she'd been there and seen the whole thing, when really she'd just heard us tell the story many times.

 

[Ogdred Weary]

I wonder if persistent reading/hearing about something can give rise to a false memory? I had a friend who used to tell the story of the time we went to a nightclub and my tights fell down because the elastic waist gave way. She told it most amusingly - the only problem was that she wasn't there when it happened. She couldn't go with us that night and I was there with another friend (who also verified that first friend wasn't there). But she wouldn't have it and swore blind that she'd been there and seen the whole thing, when really she'd just heard us tell the story many times.

I agree, I've noticed that some of my anecdotes have become the anecdotes of friends and family down the years. I don't think I'm guilty of believing other people's memories are my own but I think I've recounted other people's anecdotes as though I was there when I wasn't. Sometimes it's just easer to do so, rather than explaining that someone else related the story to me and I feel that doing that often robs the story of some of its power. I wonder if people start off like that and eventually end up falsely believing they were "there" as it were.

Reading about the mythical "Thunderbird Photo" over the years has, in the past, almost made me feel like I've seen it, even when I'm certain I haven't. There was a letter to FT years ago about a playground tale of giant one eyed centipede under a primary school, the writer said tat just writing about it made them feel as though they had seen it when they knew that this was absurd, reading the letter gave me a very clear image of said beastie under my old primary school and made me feel the memory was my own... Most people are not as analytical or thoughtful as the posters here and probably end up believing all sorts of things through similar processes.

 

[MorningAngel]

I went to see the Memory of Water at the Hampstead Theatre in London yesterday and there’s an interesting piece about memory in the programme. I hope you can read it ok, I had to downgrade the images to load them.

 

[Impybat]

This thread had jogged a couple of false memories for me. One is me sitting in a horse-drawn carriage (dream...or past life?) and the other is lounging on the floor in my childhood home circa early 70's playing with a set of Popeye Fisher Price Little People. To the best of my knowledge those don't exist.

 

[PriestessOfAvalon]

Does anyone else harbour one or more 'false memories'?

For example, I clearly 'remember' a sighting of a helicopter - a large Sea King-kind of deal - hovering over my grandparents' back garden in London when I was 3-4 years old. I recall being woken by the noise in the night, and going downstairs to join my parents and grandparents at the back door to watch it....except no-one but me could ever remember anything about it.

When I was 5, my cousin from abroad came to stay. She was 16 and our family went to the fair down the road from my house. I have two memories of this fair that no one else seems to remember. I remember my cousin and I were on the ferris wheel and it broke down when we were right at the top and the fire brigade came and we had to climb down a ladder to get off. And I remember them giving helicopter rides there too.

 

[Iris]

Last year I planted some of that flat Italian parsley and it has seeded and come up everywhere.
I also planted some of the curly English parsley which is harder to grow.
I was sure I had seen a healthy plant of the English variety growing in a pot this week so thought I might put it in one of the raised gardens I've cleared of weeds.
I can't find that plant anywhere so I must have dreamt it I suppose.

 

[catseye]

I could have sworn that I had two identical casserole dishes. You know, those old pyrex things with a design on the side. I remember about three months ago having them out and thinking 'gosh, I never knew they were the same design, I thought I just had two roughly the same size', but them being a matching pair.

Washing them up yesterday and one has a poppy design on the side, the other has black snowflakes. I am pretty sure I've never seen the snowflake one before...