Old pictures bring new smiles
My kids thought it was a good idea at a mini-family reunion to have an activity, and so we gathered around the table.
In the middle sat a bin of old photos that no one has seen in years. They mostly came from my aunt’s house, but even she couldn’t remember where they had been stored before that. I didn’t even know they existed.
There’s something about old photos of people you don’t even know but care about because somewhere in those black and white grainy images are your relatives and without them, you wouldn’t be the person you are.
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Some of the people I could recognize, if not by face, then from stories heard over the years. I couldn’t pick out my Great Grandma Veronica from a lineup, but I could tell you I apparently make scrambled eggs the exact same way she used to.
But looking at those stacks of yellowing photos made me pause and think about how much for granted we take photography these days. Everyone with a smartphone can take hundreds of photos at any given time. We have the luxury of reviewing them immediately and repositioning the subjects before retaking or knowing whether or not that one person blinked again when the shutter closed. Isn’t there always one blinker in the family?
That one special image that tugs at the heart
Even more than being able to check for closed eyes and funny smiles, I think we also take for granted how special one image can be.
We can snap dozens without a care in the world, but when my grandmother posed on that pony, they probably only had one chance to get it perfect. There were no filters, no Photoshop edits. There was a single press of a button and maybe a flash of a cube and that second in time was forever frozen just how it was.
And then there are the group photos, with families dressed more formally than I’ve seen in years, all lined up impeccably. What did those mothers and grandmothers say to make sure no one made faces or gave bunny ears?
Some of my favorite photos, however, are the candid ones taken on holidays. Groups of people celebrating something, maybe Christmas with family or New Years with friends. How the photographer managed to capture the good mood of smiling faces on every person seems almost magical.
It’s hard to remember these days to make prints of the photos we take and share on little screens, but part of me wants to do the extra work and put the prints in a box. Hopefully someday, some future relatives of mine can gather around a table and look through and wonder what life was really like way back when.
Reach Karrie McAllister at mckarrie@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on The Daily Record: Dirt Don't Hurt: Family memories stored in old photos
