MEMORIES

The world is shaped by
two things – stories told
and the memories they
leave behind.
~Vera Nazarian

A few years ago, while we were packing up our home of nearly 40 years, the home where we raised our family, I had so much angst about the things I couldn’t take with me. The last survivors of the children’s school projects, certain pieces of bulky, and often dusty, furniture, and beautiful wall hangings lovingly gifted, or made, by a generation that had already passed on. Letting go of PHYSICAL memories has always been difficult for me.

We had to downsize to move to the beautiful and rural home where Mark & I planned to spend our retirement years, hopefully, without too much clutter. LOL, when you give shelter to a growing family with children still in school, you receive precious trinkets often. Sometimes the glue on those cherished keepsakes dries too fast to hold them together long enough for you to even dust them daily. But with the dust, cracked edges, faded colors, and more, some of these little knickknacks become too treasured to toss. As for clothing, even those pieces worn to wonderful occasions, go out of style, become frayed, or… shudder… just don’t fit your aged figure anymore. And then, of course, the neighborhood you lived in, with nearby stores and other conveniences, and neighbors that you hold dear as friends. There is just so much to be left behind.

So long as we are blessed with our full faculties, memories are the one thing we never do leave behind. We discarded MOST objects that we knew would not survive the move… and some more things we carefully packed did not live through the actual move. After living in our new home for four years, just my husband and me, there are STILL boxes we haven’t unpacked, mostly because there is no room to properly display the keepsakes within. I really do not miss the clutter, and certainly not the ability to “clean” for last-minute company in less than half an hour, but sometimes I do miss the artwork and photos adorning every single living room wall and corner.

I have my memories and in the event that they get a little foggy, I took pictures of almost EVERY arts and crafts project that my kids brought home; I took pictures of the rooms from different angles, not even minding when I caught some of the clutter; I took pictures of cookie jars that I donated (and almost never used myself); I took pictures of the back yard where my kids swam in the summer and sledded down in the winter; and I even took photos of the backyard corner where we buried our pussycats who had lived out their years sharing their purrs with us.

Mark and I have a beautiful home and property. We have terrific neighbors. And one more huge plus, our yard, and the surrounding community are often filled with various wildlife (deer, fox, bear, coyote, wild turkey, birds, squirrels, and more) who willingly share THEIR home with us. And I have my memories…

The ONLY problem I have is digitizing ALL of these photos to save room!