If a forest is empty and a tree falls does it make a sound?

I’m sure most people are familiar with that old trope but what if you have no memory of something that happened to you. Would it still have been you?

What am I withering on about?

Today I had what I’m fast coming to think of as Facebook-vu. An old friend posted a picture of a bunch of us from – as near as I can make out – twelve years ago. Now the thing is, it’s clearly me in the picture: my face, my hair, etc but: I have no recollection of either the photo being taken or when. I mean zip not just a little faded or I don’t really remember it but stuff around it. I mean gone: no context whatsoever

It’s not the first time it’s happened either. A friend from way back when I was tiddler once related a completely believable story about me and again I had no actual memory of the event at all. In fact I seem to forget a lot of things around the ten year mark. Anyone else get this? I don’t mean something you remember on prompting I mean full blown lack of recall.

And more importantly does that mean it actually happened to me? After all our perception of reality is almost entirely defined by our senses and our memory. Am I still that Neil? Why am I drinking lager from a cup? Why am I trying to perform some kind of demon gurn?

These are important questions.

Now, for anyone wondering why I write – that’s why. Because I am cursed blessed with a mind that will not shut off and so I have to give it stories to chew on or it starts gnawing on me. That concludes today’s insanity

Like what I do? Sign up for my latest updates and receive occasional free fiction.