Questions that bring a childhood back.
A childhood does not come back when you ask for it. It comes back when you are given a door: a room, a rule, a person. These questions are doors. You do not need a date for any of them. “I was about seven” is enough.
How to use them
- Pick one. Not the best one. The one that made you pause.
- Say it out loud for two minutes, or write until you run out.
- Give it a rough time: an age, a house, a season. Guessing is fine.
- Leave it there. Come back tomorrow for another.
Where you come from
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Answer it
What is your earliest memory, and why do you think that one stuck?
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Answer it
What was the unspoken rule in your family, the one everyone obeyed and nobody said out loud?
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Answer it
How was anger expressed in your childhood home? What did you learn to do with yours?
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Answer it
What did you have to do to get attention or approval as a child?
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Answer it
In what way do you resemble a parent more than you would like to admit?
Scenes to walk back into
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Answer it
Your earliest memory
What is the first thing you remember? It doesn’t have to be important. Where were you, who was there, and what did it feel like?
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Answer it
A warm childhood scene
A clear, good scene from childhood. Put yourself back there: the light, the sounds, who you were with.
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Answer it
A scene from your teens
A vivid moment from somewhere between thirteen and nineteen. Who were you trying to be?
From the 21 days of Where it began
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Answer it
The house you grew up in. Walk in through the front door and tell me what you see.
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Answer it
The kitchen at dinner time. Who sat where, and what did it sound like?
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Answer it
A grown-up you felt safe with. What did they do that made it so?
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Answer it
A teacher you still remember, and why.
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Answer it
A friend from before you were twelve. What did you do together?
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Answer it
A day you were proud of yourself as a child.
Read the longer version.
Every answer lands in its place.
Say it, and Lapriland writes it down in your words and puts it on the line of your life, whether it happened today or when you were about nine.