Dustin apparently set his alarm for like 3am today in order to beat me to the blog topic punch. It was a pretty smart move on his part. There was a good chance that I wouldn’t be able to find an old family photo in order to blog about it. And, he almost had me beat. My computer that I know has the old photos on it is currently in less than working condition. Which would make finding a photo not so easy…
And then I remembered that I had blogged about digitizing some old family photos!
As Darrell Hammond playing Sean Connery would say, shuck on it, Ray. Shuck it long. And shuck it hard.
Behold.
My dad, as a wee child with a giant head.
And someone (probably my grandfather) holding a can of lighter fluid in a tantalizing matter.
Do you even need the back story?
Well, I will just have to give you some back story. In order to keep Dustin from alleging that I am cheating. Because apparently I am on notice for claiming that putting words in Kristian’s mouth counts as guest-blogging. Blah blah blah nobody likes a stickler for the rules.
Anyways, my Dad grew up in the 1950’s. A time when nobody wore seatbelts or wore bike helmets. A time without padded playground surfaces. Or lead paint regulations. A time, apparently, when lighter fluid was an acceptable baby toy. A time before the popularity of class-action lawsuits.
I’d like to think that there is a happy medium between wrapping our kids up in bubble-wrap before sending them outside to play and sprinkling broken glass under the monkey bars. Do kids still play on monkey bars? Or have they been deemed too dangerous to front teeth and offensive to gorillas? We had monkey bars in our backyard when I was little. And my teeth are just fine. Except for all of the cavities. And I’m sure that the two things are in no way related. Sure, I might have landed on my head a few times, with only the hard packed dirt to cushion my fall. But I doubt that it had any effect on my applesauce. Mumbly peg. Shower curtain?
My grandmother has been scanning a bunch of old slides (the only credit that I can take for this is that I approved her choice of a slide scanner). I can’t wait to see her photos!
I’m a huge fan of old family photos. We have framed copies of several of them on our main stairway. My paternal grandparents’ wedding portraits. My maternal grandfather’s football team. My great-grandparents’ high school photo. These old photos connect me to my past and to my older relatives who I love dearly. And they sure do look classy!
Do you have any old photos kicking around?
My grandmother did the same for us this year (scanned a stack of pics for each of her kids’ families) and they were great to look through. I’d like to look into scanning some of their slides/negatives though to archive them for my own desires at some point while they’re still alive and can tell me what the pictures are of. What would you recommend for that?