Photos—Please Don’t Bend

The most wonderful package arrived!

Inside, precious photos of my dad and his family lay loose in a manila folder.  The photos, some faded, some discolored, some fuzzy, some studio perfect preserved in time-yellowed paper-waffle frames, squeeze my heart.

All the photos took place before I was even an imagination.

My dad’s cousin Dale and his wife Theresa sent them. I am so grateful!

It morphs a raw, seemingly insignificant moment of time into a masterpiece with not one iota of human effort.

Viola!

Seeing dad with his trumpet in his high school band uniform transports me to my childhood living room with wall-to-wall red shag carpet and a large record player console practically as big as a couch. Suddenly, I’m a little girl with my ear to the speaker listening to A Taste of Honey by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass while dad plays expertly along.

Seeing my Grandpa John and Grandma Addie’s photos catapult me to their house where the mountains frame their land.

Suddenly, I’m in the chicken coop collecting eggs amid a flurry of feathers and cluck, cluck, clucks.

Suddenly, I’m at the big white kitchen stove near the window, stirring and stirring and stirring Grandma Addie’s chocolate pudding that takes too long to get thick; but ooh, when it’s done, how warm and velvety it tastes!

Suddenly, I’m on the big metal teeter-totter on a wooden seat with my sister Christie at the other end under the pine tree where the crows caw-caw the sun down reminding us to hurry inside before the mosquitoes bite.

Lest you think me dramatic, my dad passed away in 2009.  In 2018, we lost all his pictures in the Camp Fire—the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California history.  In an unusual set of circumstances, Christie had them all at her house in Magalia. Luckily, she wasn’t home at the time of the fire that annihilated her home, her cars, and all her possessions.

I shall remember Dale and Theresa’s gift.  Someday, I’ll too send photos more meaningful to others.

For memories are the only key to unlock the magic.