Last week, I asked my brother-in-law a simple question: what did your childhood bedroom smell like? He went quiet for a moment, then his face lit up. “Pine,” he said. “Pine boards my dad used to panel the walls. And that musty smell from the heating vent in winter.”
That’s when I knew his mind was sharper than most people his age.
At 64, I’ve watched too many friends lose these connections to their childhood. But I’ve also observed those who maintain them, and the difference is striking. They’re the ones who can still access not just what happened, but how things felt, smelled, and sounded decades ago.
1. The exact texture of your childhood home’s doorknobs
Close your eyes and put your hand on the doorknob to your childhood bedroom. Can you feel it? The weight, the temperature, whether it was smooth or had ridges?
This tactile memory runs deeper than you might think. Our brains store physical sensations in ways that connect to our spatial awareness and emotional memories. When someone can recall the specific feel of those doorknobs, they’re accessing a network of connections that, in my experience, many people lose.
I can still feel the cold brass knob of our front door, loose in its housing, requiring that specific quarter-turn jiggle to catch properly. My hand remembers the motion ffity years later!
2. Your mother’s everyday shoes
Not her fancy shoes. Not the ones from photos. The ones she wore around the house when you were seven or eight.
This memory tests something specific: mundane visual details that had no particular importance at the time. Brains that age well can retrieve these ordinary images because they maintained the connections between visual memory and emotional context.
3. The sound of your family’s car door closing
Every car door has its own sound. The weight of it, the seal of the weather stripping, the particular rattle or thunk.
Auditory memories like this one are processed in multiple brain regions simultaneously. When you can recall the specific sound of your family car’s door, you’re showing that these regions are still communicating effectively. It’s not just hearing a generic car door sound. It’s that particular combination of metal, weight, and closure that belonged to your family’s station wagon or sedan.
Our family had a 1970s Ford that required a firm slam to properly latch. Too soft and you’d hear my father’s voice: “Close it right.” The door had a hollow, tinny sound followed by a solid click.
4. What the air smelled like right before a storm
This one surprises people, but smell memories from childhood are among the strongest indicators of preserved cognitive function.
Where I grew up, summer storms would announce themselves with a sweet, earthy smell mixed with hot concrete. The air would go still and heavy. Birds would stop singing.
If you can also recall not just the fact of storms but the full sensory experience of their approach, I’d say your mind is preserving complex memory networks remarkably well.
5. The route to your elementary school
Can you mentally walk or drive the route from your childhood home to elementary school? Not just the major streets, but the details: which houses had dogs, where you had to step off the sidewalk because of tree roots, the spot where you’d start to hear playground sounds?
Spatial memory and navigation rely on the hippocampus, one of the first brain regions affected by age-related decline such as Alzheimer’s disease. When someone can mentally traverse childhood routes with detail, they’re demonstrating preserved hippocampal function.
I’m lucky that I can still map every crack in the sidewalk on my eight-block walk to school, remember which yard had the mean German Shepherd, where the crossing guard stood. This isn’t just nostalgia. It’s evidence of maintained spatial-temporal memory networks.
6. Your teacher’s handwriting on the board
Think of a specific teacher from elementary school. Can you see their handwriting? The way they formed their letters, whether they pressed hard or soft with the chalk?
Teachers’ handwriting was something we stared at for hours, and the ability to recall its specific characteristics indicates preservation of detailed visual processing.
7. What your best friend’s house smelled like
Every house has its own smell, though we rarely noticed our own. But your best friend’s house, that was different.
This memory combines social, emotional, and sensory elements. It requires you to access not just factual memory but the subtle sensory experiences tied to emotional connections. Brains that can recall these intimate sensory details are maintaining the delicate connections between memory, emotion, and sensory processing.
My best friend’s house smelled like coffee and cigarettes mixed with whatever his mother was cooking, usually something with paprika. Their coat closet had a particular mothball and wet wool smell I can summon instantly. These aren’t memories we tried to preserve. They simply embedded themselves through repetition and emotional significance.
Closing thoughts
If you could recall most of these memories with sensory detail, your mind is maintaining connections that I’ve noticed many people lose by 60 or so.
Try this exercise with friends. Share these sensory memories. You’ll be surprised how discussing them brings out details you thought were lost. And pay attention to which friends can access these memories with clarity. As far as I can see, they’re the ones whose minds are likely to stay sharp well into their later years.
