finding the scrapbooks
I think I’m going to blame Riley.
She wants to have a yard sale in the front yard.
(I strongly dislike yard sales. Having them, at least. They never seem to make enough money to justify the time spent organizing and the time spent standing outside your house for one whole day and the time spent taking every leftover thing to the thrift store after you finish wasting your entire day not selling it all.)
However. Her idea for a yard sale made me think I should go through a closet or two and that led me to unearthing the bags full of scrapbooks. Actual scrapbooks. Books made with sticky pages and peel away film and cut out photographs and the painful revelation that I have had a long and well documented history of really really horrible hair decisions. (For the love. Wasn’t anyone my friend? Why didn’t anyone ever tell me that my hair is unflattering parted in the middle? And my hair looks ridiculous cut in some weird short permed angular bob thing? Truly people. I’m looking at you – every person that has known me since high school. I need to know – does my hair look some sort of foolish right now that I will inevitably regret when I look at me ten years from now? Whatever. It probably does. But no one is going to let me in on the secret. Fine. I’ll live with it. Like I’ve been doing for decades apparently.)
At first I was hesitant to delve right into the abyss that could be twenty-five years worth of pictures and memories. Afraid of what my heart might feel while viewing the images of one life paired with living the reality of another life. But I jumped in anyway and you know what – I spent an hour here and an hour there, calling the kids in to see pictures of me on a horse when I was ten – wearing a giant blue cowboy hat. And pictures of babies just home from the hospital. Memories of college days and dating days and adoptions and birthdays and ordinary life and extraordinary moments and all the stuff that falls in-between both of those that I deemed worthy of a click and a save and a glue-it-to-the-page.
It wasn’t so sad as I thought it might be.
Because it has been a solid life. A whole lotta lovely and bits and threads of hard and So Much Fun and a pile of adorable. And when I look at all those books – now tidily and safely packed into three giant Rubbermaid storage bins – I see memories and recollections and proof. Proof that although my story may not be shaping up as I thought it would, it had a good beginning, a satisfying middle. And I just don’t have any idea of what type of end. But that’s two thirds already and it’s hard to complain when a giant chunk of my existence is overflowing with teaching a myriad of high school students and trips with my family and welcoming babies and tending to toddlers and celebrating both the mundane and the marvelous with the same level of enthusiasm.
And the kids point to the pictures and they say, “We were so happy” and I agree. I say, “Yes. We really were.” Because I know they want proof too.
I am reminded that the past really happened. All The Better. And all The Worse. It can’t be rewritten, even if you really want it to be. You can’t take away The Happy. Or The Hard.
It can, however, be misrepresented. It can be glossed over and it can be made Too Little or Too Large.
I’m working on trying to not do any of the above. (And it’s proving to be a mighty task.)
But – believe it or not – the pictures help. They remind me of what was good. (And yes, a little painful as they also remind me of what has been lost.) And yet – mostly, a reminder of What Actually Was.
A dose of reality that balances the nostalgia and the cynicism.
10 Comments
Sara
That crazy DC trip with a Franklin County dad who was absolutely certain he could maneuver DC traffic.
Ha!
Good memories.
laceykeigley
ha!!
Marion
Love you lots! I’ve always thought you’re adorable!
And regarding your hair…keep it blonde. ????
laceykeigley
Yes – keep it blonde. 🙂
And that had to be the dumbest choice I ever made to “impress” a boy.
Well. At least one of them.
Deborah
Goodness. I know exactly what you mean … I have a gratitude journal from several years ago… At a time when our newly adopted boys were crazy (as though it’s calm now lol) and it was hard and all I really remember from those days is The Very Very Hard. I’ve classified that time in our lives as Insane. And when I Completely Lost It and had a mental break.
But the other night I got it out. And read it at the supper table. To my shock, it was filled with GOOD. (Duh. It’s a gratitude journal). But still? It’s reshaping my memories just a bit. It’s reminding me that being thankful is possible even in the oh-so-excruciating. And it’s crucial for me to do this, or I think a part of me dies.
It’s renewed the resolve to write again the bits of joy in our days… Things the kids say, the sweet conversation with a friend, you name it. There really is a mental change that comes with choosing joy. When it says- in everything give thanks? I don’t think it means FOR everything. But …. In the middle of each thing. Give thanks. Not just to praise God. But to get the good-God perspective back. Thanks for this post. I love your writing. 🙂
laceykeigley
This was such a good response – — I’ve re-read it several times.
So wise and true – a reminder to record good. To seek it and acknowledge it.
Sara
I love you. I want to see those scrapbooks and remember with you.
And I want you to know that you are one of the bravest people I know.
Keep on showing up, sweet friend.
laceykeigley
You would get a kick out of these scrapbooks. All the way back to high school. London saw a picture of your dad on our Washington DC field trip and thought maybe it was Melvin! 🙂
And. Thank you – for the being brave comment. Goodness knows (and so do you) that brave is never a word I would describe myself as.
Nikkie
Oh.
My scrapbooks.
They probably need some love.
I keep them on the piano and I haven’t opened them in over a year.
I, like you, have the births and adoptions and so many lovely years.
And I agree.
The reminder of what actually was (the incredibly good with the bad) is possibly what I need right now.
Thanks, Lacey.
(Also-what WERE we thinking with the hair in the early days and WHERE were our friends?! Me too, gal. Me too.)
laceykeigley
Possibly what you need – do be careful, friend. 🙂
And – who knows what we were thinking. But it was surely wrong thoughts!