Grand"mom"ments, Chapter 2

Last night my mom brought a photo album with her to hopefully spark a memory for conversation. We didn't really end up with any specific stories, but we had fun looking at the pictures. We mocked the styles (seriously, could the shorts have been any shorter and the socks been any taller?). We shared derision at the way we looked at times - mom for being overweight, me for, well, not only was I freakishly skinny, like Calista Flockhart skinny; my sister called me Ethopia girl - but my hair, oh dear God, my hair. I was going to post some photos, but I just don't know if I can. They are THAT bad. I was a tomboy and wouldn't let my mom style my hair when I was little. So by the time I decided to grow it out, I was in sixth grade. I looked like a 12-year-old boy. A boy with really bad hair. Anyway, we grinned at pictures of my sister that perfectly captured her personality. She still has some of those expressions. And we spent quite a bit of time looking at field day/softball/dance pictures and trying to remember who the other kids were. Most of the time we teased my mom about her horrific photography skills. She tried, bless her heart, but she just doesn't have it in her. It doesn't help that 110 film is far from high-quality by today's standards. There were shots that were actually framed well - rare since she tends to push the whole camera down when pushing the button so people's heads were cut off - and most of the image was in focus - also unusual since her hands shake only when holding a camera - but they were action shots of a race or something, so of course the people moving were blurry. And seriously, why did we feel the need to keep every single photo? There was one of which 3/4 was the back of someone's head. I was the same way until I was rescued by Creative Memories 15 years ago and began a scrapbooking journey of amazing proportions. But that's for another time...

Anyway, suffice it to say that I don't have any grand epiphany to share, though seeing pictures of birthday parties that my mom hosted did prompt me to tell her again how much more I appreciate her now for all she did for us. And we had fun hanging out. And for now, that's all that really matters.