Scrapbooks, Photo Albums, and Memories

* In 2008 and 2009 I wrote posts for a collaborative blog called "50-something moms blog." The blog as it was cannot be found online, but I found a link to one of my posts in an early post here and the link still works. I never set up a category on my sidebar, I don't know why, so they are not readily found on this site. I did save copies of what I wrote in a  folder on my desktop - though why I thought of that I don't remember. Anyway, I am going to post them here when there is a topic that fits what I am writing about. This is my first attempt at making this work. I will make note when I get to the post I wrote all those years ago*

Yesterday I sat down on the floor and went through the envelopes, albums, and boxes of photos I brought back from my mom's house. I have been through them a dozen times in the past year, pulling out photos to share with siblings and getting those sent off. I have pulled out photos with no names and/or dates if I cannot identify the subjects, and there were dozens and dozens of those. There is no sense in perpetuating the handing down of photos that have meaning for no one. If I want to save photos to pass down, they have to be organized and readily accessible. What the kids do with them after I am gone is up to them, but I want to give them the option to keep or throw.

I wound up with the bulk of the photos because my siblings do not want them. Years ago my mom shipped me all my dad's slides, thousands of slides with some in slide holders that fit in a slide projector that would no longer move through the slides, which she had also shipped to me. Three years ago Ken and I spent long summer nights going through box after box of slides; I would pass him a slide and he would fit it into the projector so we could see it on a wall in the living room. Hours and hours over the course of several days we went through every box of slides, setting aside ones of my family. There were also hundreds of slides taken on my dad's work trips and of people I did not know. Then we pieced together a chronological order based on the dates on some slides and comparing to photos I have in albums from those years long ago. Then I sent the slides off to a company that scanned them, in the order I sent them which was a huge bonus, on a CD and made multiple copies that I shared with family members. My mom loved having all of those photos in one place and rotated the photos as the background on her computer. That alone made it worth the time and effort it took to accomplish the task.

I come from a long line of photographers on my dad's side so there are lots of photos of family get togethers at my great-grandmother's home in Toledo, Ohio in the summers of the 1960's. I started taking photos with my own camera when I was still in elementary school. I labeled and dated photos and put them in an album, grateful now that I started that habit young.

On my mom's side of the family there are formal portraits in sepia tones of her ancestors, taken either in a studio or when a photographer came to the house. Her generation and the generation before her were generous with their picture-taking, so there are many photos of her, her family, and her friends through the years. Most of those are dated so I can piece together a timeline even for the ones that are not specifically labeled.

When my brother started making trips to my mom's trailer last summer to try to make sense of what was there and all that needed to be handled, he commented to me that, "There are so many photos!" I told him that I had been sending Mom photos for over 40 years. When my kids were young and I had a 35 mm camera, I would send off a roll of film and get double prints so I had photos to share with my mom and Ken's family. The sharing of photos continued through my life with grandkids and right up until my mom's death. My family is well documented.

Maybe some of what I just wrote will be repeated in my post from January 2009, but I don't want to edit what I wrote then because I'd like to save it as I wrote it.

*Posted on the 50-something moms blog January 6, 2009:

I have a scrapbook that my mother started for me when I was a young child.  It holds birthday cards, photos of my friends from kindergarten, letters from relatives and friends, and my first library card.  This scrapbook has survived a life on various closet shelves and numerous moves, one of the few things that remain from a childhood that started in the mid 1950s.  It means a lot to me.

 
I have a photo album that I started when I got my first camera, over 40 years ago.  The square, black and white photos that fill the first pages hold memories of early friends and Christmas celebrations.  I  have photos from when I graduated to color film and a photographic record of when I had my hair done for my first prom.  These photos provide a priceless component in the historical record of my life.  It was fitting that I would want my children to have a comparable record of their childhoods.

   
The tradition started with baby books for each one of my children.  The overflow of cards and photos needed a home, which led to the start of a scrapbook for each child.  As they got older, my children selected the photos they liked and decided what mementos they wanted to save.  Their scrapbooks are filled with birthday and vacation photos, cards, awards, postcards, and graduation programs.  A scrapbook is the perfect reminder when a child is tempted to say, "I never went anywhere."  Oh, we went places and there is physical evidence to prove it.

Our family photo albums serve as an archive of people, places, and events that we have known and enjoyed.  The photos remind us of where we've been and who we've known. They serve as a resource  when we try to remember when we traveled to Memphis or who attended Grandma's wedding.  My children love to show off the family photo albums when a friend visits and expresses interest.  Some photos are good for a laugh.  Others elicit oohs and aahs as the pages are turned.

I sometimes wonder if my grown children appreciate the memories that have accumulated over the years.  Then one of them will ask, "Mom, is there room for these ticket stubs in my scrapbook?"  I smile and respond in the affirmative.  For all their digital photos and computer files, my children still appreciate a scrapbook they can hold open on their lap to remind them of the special events in their life.  For all that my children no longer need me to do, I can still track the passage of time and keep the family archives for the sake of history and the generation to come.

Gettin' Done

I learned when I moved to Maine that there were different ways to put words together. My favorite Maine phrase is "right out straight." It means to be really busy. A close second is "gettin' done," which means to resign, or to be fired or laid off.

I am gettin' done at the 50-Something Moms blog.

It's my choice, and I am parting on good terms. My priorities for my writing have changed, and it's time for me to refocus where I put my energy. My posts there took time to write and have a different voice because they were written for a different audience. [If you're curious, I've added a link on the side to my posts on that site.]

I want to spend more time writing here and visiting the blogs of women I've come to know and enjoy. It takes time to keep up with what others are writing, think about what they've said, and frame comments that add to the conversation.

It's also time for me to officially acknowledge that "mom" is no longer my #1 role. I am a lot of things and 50-something mom has moved down on the list.

There are different ways to put words together. I am 50 something, and I am a mom, but those two words put together are no longer the first way I define myself.

Not Perfection

My latest post is up over at the 50-something moms blog. I just emailed someone about leaving PHOTO SENT on the end of the title. I don't mean to be picky. I think presentation matters. Those words included in the title are a message to the women who manage the blog that the photo to accompany the post has already been sent via email and are not meant to be included with the title upon posting. Someone may or may not be able to edit the title now that it's posted. Today that's okay with me. There was a time when I would have been anxious and pacing over the mistake.

I am a recovering perfectionist, which I wrote a bit about in my post Good Enough. A good friend left the comment, "Strive for excellence, not perfection." I took that to heart, so much so that I say those words often as I work to finish a project. It has helped to have a mantra of sorts to move things along, and I've actually finished projects that otherwise would still be undone.

For the first thirty years of my life I thought that perfection was attainable. My father used to say, "If it's worth doing, then it's worth doing right." In my childlike mind that meant that I should always do my best, and I translated that into the need to accomplish perfection. Whether sewing a dress, painting a room, writing a paper, or forming an argument, I wanted the end product to be the best it could be. That meant there was always more that could be done to improve the seams sewn, the painted edge of the molding, the sentence structure, and so on...and on and on. My mother or my husband used to say, "But no one else will know, Sharon." And I thought to myself, I will know. I will know that I didn't do my best.

I realized years ago that the bar was so high that I would never be able to reach the standards I had set. I was paralyzed because there were things I could not make perfect, and in trying to do the impossible I set myself up for failure. It was me that I needed to talk down off the ledge of perfection. The person I needed to please was myself, which meant that I needed to change my perspective. I have been working on that change for more than two decades.

There are times when I am not completely satisfied with something I've done. Now, that's okay with me. I don't have to be 100% satisfied with everything I do. I do the best I can, and sometimes I need to let it go.

The interesting thing I've learned is that it's often not the physical thing I'm doing that is making me unhappy. There is something in me that is bothering me. I have learned to stop what I'm doing and acknowledge how I'm feeling. Then I ask, "What's really bothering me?" I've planted the question, so even if I keep going with the project or errands or whatever, I have acknowledged that something is out of kilter. Sometimes I stop completely and make myself a cup of coffee or go for a walk. I change gears if what I'm doing isn't working. I focus on what I'm doing at that moment. I intentionally think positive thoughts. Then my mind relaxes and releases what was gumming up the works: my fear about what's wrong with the car, my worry about getting/not getting the job I want, or my concern about something that is none of my business. Invariably, the physical thing I was doing gets easier and I'm content with the results.

I still like to do things well. The difference is that now I am not obsessed with perfection. I haven't done everything I set out to do today; there's always tomorrow or the next day or next week. And the small glitch with the title of my post at the 50-something moms blog? Well, that rates no more than a passing thought.

The Last Lesson of Randy Pausch

*Note: My latest post at 50-something moms blog: Lessons I Learned About Kids and Computers. Also, I am now listed as a contributor under the "About Us" tab on the 50-something moms site. Check it out!

At the moment I am breathless and sweating. I went down to the end our our driveway to pick up the paper and leave letters in the mailbox. Then I just took off walking, as fast I could go. I needed time to reflect and talk to myself. What did I want to write about the death of Randy Pausch?

Earlier this summer Diane Sawyer did a special report for ABC about Randy Pausch and his Last Lecture. If you don't know, Randy was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer last year at age 47, married 8 years with three small children. He was a professor at Carnegie Mellon and gave a lecture, that was to be his last, about the lessons of life. The talk was meant for his children, to be guidance for them when he was no longer there. Through the magic of the internet his lecture was launched to the world and received with open arms.

I learned on Sunday that Randy Pausch died Friday, July 25. I was deeply saddened. It is one thing to know that someone has a terminal illness but something else altogether when that person dies. Last night Diane Sawyer hosted a special update on Randy's last days. He talked about his last trip to the hospital and was shown at home playing with his children and hugging his wife. I held it together until the show flashed back to the end of his lecture when he says, "It's not about your dreams. It's about how you lead your life."

Randy did not know how many days he had left. He made the point that none of us know. It's what he continued to do, right up until his last day on earth, that is the lesson for all of us: he lived his life. His words had a huge impact on me. The video of him laughing with his family at the end of his life made those words real. His dreams did not matter at the point, but how he led his life did.

On today's walk I reminded myself that on Monday's walk I said I was ready for whatever came next. I asked for opportunities to open up and present themselves. That afternoon I read about a contest for an innovation grant on Jamie's blog, where she generously shares whatever she knows with her readers. Monday evening I checked a job board I had bookmarked and found a new job listed that interests me. These were opportunities to pursue my business and apply for a part-time job in my field.

I wasn't home yesterday because I had a hair cut, an acupuncture appointment, and errands to run. During my acupuncture treatment I had a moment where I knew "what to do next" would come to me. I came home to find encouraging words from readers and helpful ideas from a girlfriend who keeps saying, "Absolutely, go for it!"

So I am going for it. I am going to enter the contest for that grant and apply for that job. The journey continues....

Shift Happens

Some things have shifted for me this week. I feel different. My optimism about the future has returned after a long absence. It started last week when I started posting on the 50-something moms blog, continued through my application for my dream job, and culminated today when my daughter came for breakfast.

This afternoon I saw Louise Hay, Martha Beck, and Cheryl Richardson on Oprah talking about the laws of attraction. They shared how they have created vision boards. Since I am more into words than pictures, I am going to start a vision list....

I will secure a job that allows me to: bring people together to collaborate; facilitate dialogue; and work to improve the life situations of people in Maine

I will get my business off the ground

I will continue to write and take advantage of opportunities to connect with women around the country

I will work on a plan for the outdoor spaces at our new home, with the help of people who know about such things - and there will be a chance for readers to give their input once I get "now" pictures ready to post

This is the beginning of my vision list. I wanted to write it here so I won't forget my intentions.

My New Team

Forget about it taking a while for me to feel at home on the 50-something moms team. They picked up my option and I'm staying. My second post is up this morning, and I feel like a little kid who just learned how to play catch. Readers posted comments on my first article and I appreciated every one. I like having the opportunity to connect with women around the country and have enjoyed visiting other women's blogs. There's a lot going on out there in the world of weblogging.

Lately I have been thinking, too much for someone who is trying to stay present, about where I fit and why it matters to me so much. It's because connection and conversation change the way I feel about my life. After a long talk with a good friend I feel energized. I feel that when I talk on the phone to a friend from away. I felt that way this past week-end when I had the chance to see people I haven't seen in awhile and we had a chance to catch up.

The hard part is finding people who want to share ideas, which is why I love to go back to school. When I take classes I find people who are interested in and want to talk about the same things. My frustration as a teacher was how hard it was to find other teachers in the same building who wanted to talk about teaching. When I did find someone it was like finding water in the desert for both of us. And typically those people were also taking classes, which gave us even more to talk about.

I cannot afford to take more classes right now. The pull is great, but I need to find other ways to expand my world. As President Jed Bartlett said in an episode of West Wing, "...I dream of ideas and diction, energy, honesty, and discussion...." I loved that so much I wrote it down. That's my dream, too.

Of Words and Pictures

My first post is already up at 50-somethingmomsblog! Check it out here. Now aren't you glad that I learned how to download digital photos to my computer? Have you ever seen such a display? Each post needs a graphic, so you will be seeing more of my [non]artistic ability.

I was wondering this week why I am not particularly artistic. My mother and sister are artists. My husband used to draw cartoons and does beautiful work with stained glass. Each of my children is an artist in their own way. The most memorable piece of artwork I created was in second grade, when I did a sponge painting of evergreens in the snow. Soon after that I learned to do embroidery, and sewing became my outlet for artistic expression.

In high school I discovered I preferred to express myself with words. I remember when it clicked - in eleventh grade my creative writing teacher read aloud in class an essay I wrote. I had named the title character "Mrs. Bitch," which described her personality. Kids didn't swear in school in those days, and I rarely used such language anywhere. The essay was my first venture into the world of wordplay, and I pulled it off.

I value the art of language, how words can give snapshots of scenes and situations. I understand how meaning and emotion can be conveyed with carefully chosen words. I know how words can heal or hurt, and I know that even words taken back can linger long afterward. So I choose my words carefully, hoping to create a short story about a life situation. And I have lots of help ~ my dictionary and thesaurus are always close at hand, and my self-editor has no off button.

This medium has provided me with an outlet for my words. I am grateful for that and for those of you who have read this far. Let the journey continue....

A New Opportunity

Well, I pushed the "send" button for my first post for the 50-something Moms Blog. I don't know when it will be posted because it's sent to an editor and put in a queue once it's approved. In the meantime I encourage you to check out the 50-somethingmoms, which is affiliated with other moms blogs all around the country, which are listed down the lefthand side of each site.

This all started when I saw "mommy bloggers" on The Today Show in May. I started reading other blogs written by women in a variety of life situations. I am amazed at what's out there. The topics, styles of writing, age of writers, reasons for writing, and all matter of details of people's lives are endless. A place to start is blogher.com which gives one list, one of many in cyberspace, of blogs by topic.

For me, this is all part of my quest to find a team. The 50-something moms are on probation because I don't know them very well yet. One writer has been helpful and I am enjoying getting to know her. I don't know how well I will fit in with this group of women, which you can see for yourself if you click the "About Us" tab at the top of the 50-something website. Most of them have a computer as an added appendage, whereas I had to print out the instructions to post on TypePad and read them four times before I even started. I just learned last month how to download photos to the computer from the digital camera, for heaven's sake! I will continue to plod along if I think I will benefit from being a part of this group, which I won't know for a while.