Some photos give me all kinds of memory cues that no one else would guess. This one’s from my mother’s Kodak Instant camera (spits out Polaroid-type shots immediately), and it was taken sometime in the week before Mother’s Day back in the Late Stone Age. I know that because my then-husband is across the table from me reading our local newspaper and the ads proclaim “Mother’s Day BARGAINS.” It would be Lynne’s first Mother’s Day without her mother, who’d died in September of the year before this photo was taken.
That kitchen is as familiar to me as the one I live in now, even after so many years have passed since I was in it. The trivets, the coffeemaker, the empty ice tray on the counter (no doubt left by me, because for some reason, it was always me who had to “take up the ice,” as we called–and still call–putting the ice in glasses before a meal).
It’s after the dinner hour. Everyone else has already eaten, because my ex and Lynne are sitting in other people’s spots at the table–and no one else is there and eating. I imagine the two of them showed up later in the evening and Mother brought out the leftovers and told them to fix a plate. It’s fried chicken, by the way, along with mashed potatoes and green beans. (Those things are visible when I embiggen the photo.) They’re both drinking iced tea (you’re welcome for the ice). I don’t know where he was coming from, but Lynne was coming from her house, because the first thing I wondered about were all those flowers on the table. I’m betting Lynne brought them out of her own garden (she’s always grown amazing roses), and Mother put them in multiple vases so she could send some home with me.
As for me: I’m trying to get shots of those roses with my Canon, and no one is paying any attention to me. They’ve obviously gotten used to the way I constantly have that thing in front of my face. I’ll bet if I looked through my own photos, I’d find shots of the roses. I’m sitting in my usual spot at the table–I still have a specific place that I always sit at my own table, and if anyone else takes it, I get twitchy.
My hair makes me laugh. For many years, I had the same hairstyle: parted in the middle, hanging down straight on either side of my face, length from mid-back to waist. But I’d finally decided that I wanted bangs to be cut and feathered back. Lynne offered to do that for me. It didn’t exactly work out that way, and it seemed like forever that I had those two stupid hanks of hair that hung without any style at all on each side of my forehead. Blech.
So it’s all there: the comforting familiarity of home, my parents’ way of offering food, a newspaper, a place to relax. My way of hiding behind a camera; Lynne’s way with flowers. This is how I want people to feel in my home–like they’re home, in a place where they can relax and be themselves.
And I continue to have a complicated relationship with my hair.
I wonder why your mother decided to take that shot? It’s a wonderful snapshot of family life.
I wondered the same thing. Maybe she’d just put a new pack of film in the camera and it was her test shot. It’s such a random shot to have taken, but those are the types that give more story, so I’m glad she did.
I really loved this entry and the feelings that brought back, not just for you – but for me.
Thanks! I’m glad.
… oh and there is nothing more upsetting then finding someone in your seat at dinner.
We are such creatures of habit.
I want to sit at this table with you.
There’s still an empty chair at the table! Would you like some tea? (It’s sweetened.)
I always love seeing vintage photos to see the decorations/style and color of furniture.
Me, too!
Good times
Good and bad and everything in between!
This is such a great entry.
I adore vintage photographs.
They have a way of bringing back people and places as nothing else is able to do.
Except for scent.
Smelling particular scents can take me on a pretty quick journey back in time, too.
I enjoyed reading this entry.
I also like your reference to your “then-husband.”
That is such a nice way to put that!
(I will be getting back to my vintage photo project. I am happy that the project I joined wasn’t time sensitive. Things have gotten out of hand . . . so I am handling them. *grins* I will get back to it, though. I have continued to set my photographs aside and I am still scanning them, dutifully!)
Thanks! I agree–only smell is more powerful. Today I learned a new word (in order to comment on someone else’s blog): macrosmatic (keen sense of smell). I think this is why I love working with essential oils so much.
Yes, sometimes it’s kind of a drag to do a photo/memory thing a day. But it has gotten me into the habit of writing something every day, even if sometimes there’s less writing, more photos.
You scan dutifully, and I will read dutifully when you’re writing about them again. Are you still planning to take your new blog totally live the end of this month?
I got to learn a new word today, too. I’d not heard of the word macrosmatic, before. I used to work with essential oils, a lot. I could always tell the fragrances of any perfume and/or essential oil when smelling it. So I like that word, very much.
I do see the sense in doing a photograph a day as a writing prompt. That was what I had in mind, originally . . . though (ultimately) I signed up for the project when I noted that it didn’t have to be completed in any sort of time frame. Once I get everything going – I will probably return to the daily plan to post vintage photographs.
I’m glad to know that you’ll be reading. Thank you. It gives me more motivation with putting that project together/moving forward with it if I know there is someone reading the posts.
🙂
My blog will be totally live by the end of the month! I have been working on bits and bobs of it, daily – so the content will be popped in over the next several days. I’ve been following a schedule for producing/transferring content – and (so far) I am still on schedule for everything to be done by June 29.
It’s silly, I suppose – but I am getting nervous!
It’s not silly at all. It’s daunting to start a new endeavor–to put your time and heart into it. Doing that is a reward in and of itself. And then you hope that other people will find it and relate to it and connect with you because of it. I hope it brings you a sense of accomplishment. It’s more creativity–and the world can always use it.
Your “vintage” kitchen looks quite similar to my current kitchen from curtains to coffee pot. Guess your mom and mine had similar decorating tastes. Great memories, thanks for sharing.
You’re very welcome. Even if my parents had stayed in one place, everything would probably be changed. My mother was a furniture-shifting, redecorating fiend. But there’d still be trivets, that I know.