Sorting and reorganizing life has become a tireless goal filled with another box of souvenirs, envelope of pictures, or notes stuffed in folders. Maybe it is approaching a milestone birthday or maybe clutter in the back closet is finally too bothersome to move around and tidy up. The other day, wandering through piles of pictures from 1996 for filing, scanning, or the trash, many seemed forgettable. Kids heads were turned away from the lens. Family members were captured chewing with their mouths half open. Lighting proven elusive and the photos shone a murky orange. Without remorse these were flipped into the trash.
Abruptly, almost like a punch in the chest, there appeared the phantoms of long-ago wishes for life, past friends, traitorous loves, lost family members, and incomplete life plans laid bare. Here in Kodachrome were images of a life past, forgotten, improbable given the 90s and crushing speed of a new century. Twenty-two years later I find myself mourning what I had thought would happen then and ultimately the loss of the dreams of what I believed was a charmed life.
Life isn’t about what plans and dreams; life is what happens each and every day, every week, each month, through the many years. Reshaping our hopes and dreams keeps us whole and allows us to move on and reclaim the joys of the moments, again growing into years of love and contentment and maybe…. cynicism and a knowledge that nothing is what it seems and life changes.
Life Gets Better 