Passage of Time

I had intended to do a blog that included pictures. But here I am, trapped in my room by a screaming three year old. So I will try to convey in words what I wanted to share with photos. Then I will add them later.

Over the course of this project I am working on for my grandmother there have been many surprises. I have been able to associate faces with names I have heard all of my life but never had any meaning to me. I have been able to peer into the past of my family and get a glimpse of what things were like.

The thing that has struck me the most though is the way time sneaks up on us. I was going through pictures and came upon one of my great grandfather Charlie Holliday. My memories of this man are sweet. He always smelled good and was loveable and proud. He was always old to me, but not in that frail sort of way some older people are. This was my memory. The picture was in his last years, when he was ill and barely able to move. He was in a hospital bed in the dining room of his home and his great grandson Jacob was looking over the railing at him. There was a physical sensation looking at this picture. Mere moments before, I had held a photo of him with his twin brothers as young men. They looked vibrant and full of life.

I think the family I was born into ages rather well. Maybe that is why it surprises me when they start to look their age or even old. My father's pictures were among those that I have been looking at. Seeing him as a little kids, a soldier, a new father, are all images I can deal with. Those even make me smile. Knowing that one day, if we are lucky enough to live long full lives, we will both be shadows of our younger days makes me sad. There is no avoiding it. Would we really want to?

I cannot even imagine what my children will be like at my age. Or my grandmothers age. Or what their children's children will think of our generation.


So as I ponder all this deep stuff I will try to savor my present, not dwell on my past or my future. I will do my best not to wish for those paths left untaken. I will do my best to pass on what I know and still be aware that a century from now it may be as though I never existed.

I hope this makes sense to someone besides myself.