Mysteries of Earliest Memory: A Game for Grownups for the Sake of Childhood

Why are some of us able to recall with ease an event from our very earliest years, while the personal past seems difficult for others to reach? And why does what stays stay? Of everything that surrounds infancy and toddlerhood and a child's explorations, how does the growing mind choose what it saves from the mists? Or does some unknown source make that choice for each of us?M B Spears invented a game -- a purely social game at first. It was meant to be a relief from her serious search into a true crime that became a very long book. Now in its 6th edition, UNSOLVED: A MURDER IN THE SOLID SOUTH became a detective, thanks to long-hidden facts and startling theories brought to her by its readers. Spears has finally turned loose the book that unearthed a conspiracy even she had not suspected. During those 4 years of dark revelation, she introduced her Game for Grownups to friends and others as a relief -- a playful approach to the personal past. And it was, but not for long. The past is always a teacher.She soon recognized that her little Game -- like UNSOLVED her true-crime book -- was uncovering more than she had counted on. Searching the personal past was pleasant for participants, but all along it was revealing hard truths about today. Oh, some of it was simply fun. For instance, one of the questions that kept asking to be answered was whether little boys and little girls think differently from each other from the get-go? The answer is -- read the book and decide from the evidence. Another question asking to be answered: Are the earliest memories of most of us scarey? No, they're not. Instead, they offer clues to our future selves. They really do. We can look at who we are today and see that we shouldn't have been surprised, because all along the personal past was there to light each of us on our way. But as my friends and I played the Game, life interrupted. Daily news, continually being drummed into our awareness by technologically delivered media, was telling about an increasing wave of violence against the minds and bodies of children -- assaults from people who should have been their protectors. Such a gruesome, worrying backdrop for our light-hearted Game made a difference. It changed this book about the personal past into an indictment of society today. A serious book. A book dedicated to opening grownup eyes to the dangerous path which technology has led us down. Let's give it a name: entertainment addiction. Entertainment addiction changes the young (and many such addicts are already adults) into strangers, separate in their sorry hearts, liable to turn killer because they feel so little for others -- co-workers, the afflicted, even children. Even babies. Entertainment addiction is not a disease. It's a choice. Entertainment addiction is a path beside a precipice.