Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Family Crap Heirlooms

Large Edwardian Wedding PhotoYou can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your family.

I don't know why I thought of that. It is not like I am thirteen again.

I have been looking at old photos lately, oh, and this is not a photo of my family. Yeah, there is Leesa, third on the left, second row, with the three kids at her feet. Am I the only one that sees children at the feet of someone and thinks of the family dog? Yeah, dogs and kids, at the feet, eating table scraps. Sorry.

I have a lot of old photos of people I have never met – people who have died 60 or more years ago. I say that I "love" these photos, but you know, if they get lost in a fire, how heart-broken will I be? I carry around the photos because I was given them to safeguard. Almost anyone who would have known these people are dead, and the living ones are not very lucid anyway. "Hey, grandpa, go easy on the Wild Turkey." And I always think to myself, "what the hell, he is 90-some-odd years old, what harm can it do?"

Then I look at other things that I cart around or keep in storage. Some of the items are great-grandparents-old-this-or-that. It had sentimental meaning for my great-grandparents or grandparents, but I never used the item. I would have been more sentimental over an old Donny and Marie Record Player. That reminds me of when I was a girl – not some old hair brush.

Of course, then my Catholic genes kick in and I start to feel guilty. "Sorry, Great Grandma Ida, I know you must have counted brush strokes – ninety-eight, ninety-nine, one hundred – and it was especially meaningful for you to pass onto your children. But sooner or later it becomes stuff in a box, taken out ever other decade. Eventually someone will inherit it, and it might find its way to Ebay. Maybe.

Of course, I could buy an old Donny and Marie Record Player on Ebay if I act fast.

9 comments:

Diane Mandy said...

I think old photos are pretty cool. Of course, this may be because my family hasn't passed many down from generation to generation.

Donny and Marie record player? Better act fast!

Deb said...

GOD - I had such a wild crush on Marie Osmond! That was my very first crush actually! :) AND --- she is still beautiful!!! *heart pounds*

You know what I do with old photos - I frame them really nicely and put them up to give that 'rustic feel'. I've been doing that lately and taking old photos from past family members, because I totally love my big fat Italian family - it's awesome to see the family tree placed up in a modern NY apartment.

I don't understand photos in a box stored somewhere collecting mold and dust. Use it - use it for decorating - even if you don't know the entire bunch!

And the three kids sitting on the floor - can't see you doing that!

Leesa said...

diane: yeah, I love old photos.

~deb: and I had a crush on Donny, purple socks and all. His is shirtless in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

Casdok said...

Donny! He brings back a few memories!!!

Adrianne said...

Well just think, you were able to write a good blog post about it?

You are so funny. Its amazing what we are left to remind ourselves of our ancestors. I like monetary gifts but my favorite my great grandmother left my mother was a necklace of a mustard seed. I would have preferred the pictures!

Blog hog said...

Oh Leesa sweets,

I love really old photo's like you have posted. Part of me would love to live in those days but the other part of me says I would miss all the comveniences that we have today. Plus, I donnt own any suits... they suire dressed nice back then! hehe

Leesa said...

casdoc: I used to love the way he sang.

ssc: thanks. I like ~Deb's idea of hanging old pictures up.

gw mush: I have thought about living back then. It would definitely be different. I would miss the air conditioning more than anything else.

Preity Angel... said...

I love seeing old photoes...thanks for sharing...lovely picture

Leesa said...

angel: thanks, sweetie. I love sepia, too.