Some memories belong to a photograph so completely that you cannot separate seeing it from being there.

Some memories are really the photograph. You have looked at it so many times that the image has replaced whatever you originally held, and now you remember the composition, the angle, the frozen expression, from a viewpoint you never occupied. The picture preserved the moment and quietly consumed the memory of it.

With an important occasion, try recalling it once before looking at any pictures, and note what you get. Smells, what was said, what you were worried about. That material fades fastest and no image will bring it back later.