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I always think about one memory I have that might not be true. I was very young--3 years old--and I have relatively vivid (visual) memories. But, it was a life-and-death circumstance, maybe that matters.

I fell off the dock while fishing. My dad was 20 or 30 yards away. I remember being underwater, I remember the water being stained green a bit, I remember seeing fish I was used to catching (perch), and most importantly, I remember how it feels to be lifted up by your scalp. My dad just grabbed my hair in one hand and lifted me straight up out of the water vertically. You would think it hurts, but it doesn't--at least at the weight of a 3 year old.

The event for sure happened, I'm just not convinced I didn't create a specific memory later--maybe when I was 9 or 10.

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>I remember seeing fish I was used to catching

This didn't happen. The second you splash into that water, they're gone, far enough away from the crash at least that they csn't be spotted by foggy vision in dark green water.

Couldn't it be that his brain only fabricates that part of the memory, to fill in the blanks of panic period of being underwater?

I do think that my brain may have fabricated that part. It's the fishy part--pun intended.

I have never been picked up again by my scalp, so I think that's decent reason to believe the memory of the physical sensation is pretty accurate.

There's not a lot else to the memory.

I tend to agree, however depending on the size of fish and some other factors, many don't scare off very far. I don't think it's definitive.

(I'm an avid fisherman despite the dock fall!)

I'm not actually familiar with perch as an adult. I last caught one when I was maybe 8 years old. After googling, I believe they were "yellow perch" (caught in northern Indiana)

> I remember seeing fish I was used to catching (perch)

I think VooDooJuJu's sibling comment is correct, and jumping off from that, I wonder: do you, or did you, have dreams about that event?

This scene sounds something right out of cartoons I used to watch as a kid. I wonder if you added this scene in as part of a dream, and somehow your brain grabbed that experience and incorporated that into the memory node family.

I don't recall having dreams about it, no.

The perch are one of the only fine details I have, which is interesting. That and the scalp sensation.

I don't remember falling, and I don't remember the aftermath. I'm sure it only lasted a few seconds.

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