A while back I started writing my autobiography.

It steamed along at a great pace but suddenly, after 25,000 words it stopped. I see that the last time I touched it was last June, all of five months ago. It didn’t stop for lack of material or lack of interest yet I feel slightly uncomfortable at the thought of going back to it. Why?

After some thought, I think the reason for my discomfort is that delving back into my distant past has raised so many questions.

Why, for example, are there great tracts of time wherein I have no memories? Why did I jump from age three to age five to age fifteen with little memory of times in between? What happened during those years? I do have fleeting memories from within those blanks but they are very few and far between. Do I just have a bad memory or is there something I want to forget?

I was talking to Herself the other evening about my mother. We were discussing one particular event and how I had reacted to it when, without thinking I said “because I was afraid of her”. I had never said this before or even consciously thought it but having said it, I thought harder. And yes – I had been afraid of her. Why? Whatever reason could there be for being afraid of my own mother? It is frankly a rather disturbing thought.

There are a couple of other puzzles that I can’t answer.

Why does the carol “We Three Kings” make me very uncomfortable? For some reason it conjures up a subliminal image of fire.

And why does the image of Woody Woodpecker have very dark associations to the point of striking fear?

Sadly I am the only person left who can answer these questions.

And I don’t have the answers.