Tales of the Ordinary Days

The final picture...filter applied Tonight I am finally getting together with my friend, Angelique. It's been way too long. With a close friendship and our birthdays just short of a month apart, we find ourselves celebrating many of life's milestones together. Although we have know each other since our youngest children were in kindergarten, the closeness of our friendship began shortly after our 40th celebrations. Like our birthdays, our divorces coincided in time as well. Now with 48 years under our belts, about eight of those years as single parents, we have experienced many highs and lows of life together. Our memories are full of our adjusting to single-motherhood. Together. Stories from our joint family vacations are reminisced by our young adult children with great laughter. Mother's Days have included family golf outings and brunch. Our kids have a close kinship with each other, just like their moms. I have no doubt that collectively we will always have ...

Grandpa Jim and Zach My oldest son, Zach, was in need of a side job. With the resourceful assistance of my Aunt Kathy, we quickly filled his plate. Mounds of photo albums and stacked photographs that have been neglected in my basement were in desperate need of scanning and organizing. Kathy and I laid out a plan to conquer the project. And Zach? Definitely at the right place at the right time. After getting past the mother/son work-together-rub with Kathy's careful intervention, Zach hit the ground running. And although we have barely skimmed the ice berg, the result so far has already brought on many smiles. I have been the family historian; capturing our collective lives in picture taking, written journals, scrapbooks, saved treasures, and now a blog. My basement is full of these collected memorabilia. Taking a walk down memory lane by viewing these mementos always brings a smile. On his first attempt at super-scanning, Zach successfully scanned 287 photos spanning the ...

Pick Aunts (w/Adam, Gma, and me) Aunts (L to R) Joanie, Connie, Mom, Kathy, Barbara, Rebecca I recently visited my Aunt Kathy at her cool downtown apartment. As we sipped wine and enjoyed light conversation, a stack of photo albums caught my eye. After asking permission to peruse, I quickly surmised that I had stumbled upon some lost treasures. Kathy, a lifelong talented photographer, had meticulously documented her life through pictures. My childhood was included in her pictorial story. Many of the found photo treasures were snaps I had never seen before. Forgotten stories and ordinary days were quickly remembered with an emotional flood to my memory. I'm a sucker for pictures. When visiting friends, I find myself drawn to all the photos framed on walls and shelves. I love to hear about the different people that played such an important role that their photo is displayed front and center. An army picture of a young soldier now an elder or a baby picture of a grown man; ...