Tag Archives: life events

Sep13

No Escape

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No Escape

There’s just no escape. I’m still trapped. I’m surprised I don’t have daymares as well as nightmares. Photos are haunting. And they just won’t go away.

I spent two months in Winnipeg scanning photos. Right now they’re still as chaotically organized as they were when I returned to East Wenatchee. I’ve backed them up onto three different external hard drives and I doubt I’ll do anything more with them until I return to Mexico for the winter. And I wonder if future generations will appreciate the effort that went into this project of scanning photos. After all, today’s photos are already digitalized as the majority come from cellphones. Cameras and movie cameras before the advent of cellphones are dinosaurs. Taking rolls of film in to be developed and waiting days or weeks to see them are also a thing of the past. And there is no longer the necessity to store large, bulky photo albums. Slides and slide projectors? Almost extinct.

Photos are time consuming and I was at it again today for about four hours. But this time I wasn’t scanning. I downloaded hundreds of photos from Mexico, Washington and two trips to Canada from my phone onto my computer. I organized them into files and then backed them up onto external hard drives. And maybe someday I’ll want to look at them again.

Photos are a treasure trove of memories. People. Places. Events. Chapters in life. Unwritten memoirs. But they are nonetheless memories recorded for posterity.

Jun1

A Glimpse of the Light

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A Glimpse of the Light

I’m beginning to see a glimpse of the light at the end of the tunnel. After scanning photos for a month, I’m actually getting close to the end. Of course there are two bins still at my son’s and I haven’t a clue as to what’s in them. But I believe the majority of the bigger albums are almost done.

This morning I was at Kyle’s first day of kindergarten, Kimmy’s first haircut, Kyle’s fifth birthday party at the bowling alley and a vacation in San Diego. I’m not doing the albums in any type of chronological order so it’s been fun to skip around and see my kids at different ages.

And of course there are the pet albums. Kelsey and Koal had no idea that they were dogs. They were kids just like Kyle and Kimmy. Kelsey was around for a few years before Kyle was born. My kids had labelled him the geriatric dog. After he went to doggy heaven we got Koal. And he was quite a mischievous puppy and very different from Kelsey.

I really miss having a dog. But it’s bad enough that I have to deal with three different immigrations every year. I cannot fathom having to do that with a dog when constantly travelling from country to country. But if I ever do settle down, I would love to have a dog again.

In a way it’s been good that the weather has been so bad since I got to Winnipeg. When it rains every day I don’t feel so badly about holing up inside and going through photos. But I must admit that I miss that big, bright yellow ball that should be up in the sky instead of the ominous clouds.

And I’m still hoping for an ETA in Washington of mid-June.