There is something about different segments of a moment which trigger different nostalgic reactions. The sound of an airplane overhead, on a clear sunny day triggers long hot Phoenix summer days. I don’t know why that one particular thing takes me back there, to those days of childhood summers… In an instant though, I can feel like those afternoons of splashing in my aunt’s swimming pool and going to Baskin Robbins after dinner were just yesterday…
Another thing is the Idaho autumn air. Sometimes it can waft this certain way and I’m back at fourteen… in love… all of those feelings just swirl right up like a pile of crunchy leaves.
Genny has trickery of the senses as well…
As a reoccurring pattern for such things, where she is concerned, we’ve noticed that nostalgia induced memories seldom existed. It’s kind of funny, actually. For instance, yesterday afternoon she starts telling me about how the blossoms on this one particular tree reminded her of an afternoon (when we lived in Michigan) where I picked her up from school early so that i could take her to Starbucks and dress shopping. She went into great detail describing to me, not only the afternoon itself but the dress we chose.
G- Whatever happened to that dress anyway?
M- Sweetheart, you never had a dress like that.
G- Yes i did. I did my second grade photos in it, remember?
M- (showing her the photos from said photo shoot where she is in a peasant top and denim shorts) Nope.
G- So what did we buy that day then?
M- That day never happened, Gen. I never pulled you out of school early for Starbucks and shopping.
G- Maybe it was a dentist appointment then, and I got the D’s mixed up?
M- um, pretty sure i would not pull you out of school to go to Starbucks on the way to a dental appointment.
G- I don’t understand.
She stood there for a few moments, obviously confused, before a brightness dawned and with immense relief she exclaimed, “OH! It was a dream! I remember now. It was a dress that I was going to wear to a birthday party for some boy I had a crush on, I don’t even remember his name. It was at Christmas time, I think.”
M- Then why did the blossoms on the trees remind you?
G- I probably had a dream in the spring time.
hmm…
I tried to counteract, a few minutes later, about how I remembered this one time when I went to New York City with James MacAvoy and how he reached for my hand as we crossed the street but her sweet little twelve year old face spoke up and said, “Is he someone you worked with when you wrote for the movie ads? I remember you going to LA, but you never told me you went to New York too.”
Ah. Nevermind…
rainydayinmay.com 
Funny! I am the baby of 6 kids and there are times when we are all together and will remember an event – each one of us remembering it differently and then my mom will speak up and say "THAT never happened!"… hmmm memories are strange things!
Wow, Gen's story is great! And I laughed out loud at her words, and yours (which would have been perfectly appropriate had I not been on the phone listening to my Mother talk about something important. LOL!)
My two sisters and I often remember different things that happened when we were growing up in totally different ways. And sometimes something that is quite vivid to me is not even remembered by my elder sister. See http://growingyoungereachday.wordpress.com/2011/04/10/sunday-for-tea/. How could something that is so clear and alive to me, my other sister and a cousin have no place in my elder sister's memory.I am currently on a nostalgia kick and these memories are resurfacing from way, way down.Love to read the interaction with your 12 year old. Takes me back to my children growing up.