This is a core memory for me. I was not quite four and certainly not allowed to sit in the beautiful pink velvet armchair that had belonged to my great-grandmother. I was pretty certain it was reserved for princesses; I had never seen another soul sit in said chair. Yet my mother had directed me and my brother to perch in the throne of pink velvet and I obliged. Then my baby sister was settled between us like sapphire in open prongs.