Pictures

The last few days I have been looking through various pictures, none of which were my own (although I was in some).  Have you ever thought about how odd it is to look at someone else's pictures?  Of course, it is one way that we can keep up with what is going on in other's lives when looking at Facebook and My Space pictures.  So many of those pictures have commentary to go along with them.  What I have found strange is looking through years and years worth of pictures.  One set was a friend's pictures, and another set was a stranger's pictures.

In the friend's pictures, it is strange to see pictures of people you know and even yourself, but not know the story behind them.  I saw pictures of myself as a little girl, and it looked like we were having a blast, but I can't remember the story that goes with it.  I don't remember wearing those clothes, having those friends, doing those things.  I saw pictures of people I knew, and you wonder what the story is behind the picture.  You can see the family grow over the years, yet the love remains the same.

In the stranger's pictures, you really feel like you are invading the family's privacy.  Part of my job is to personalize a client, and when the person has died, one of the ways to do that is to use pictures.  It is odd to watch a person growing up that you never met.  It really seemed like I, as a stranger, was eavesdropping on the family with things that weren't meant to be seen.  None of the pictures were inappropriate or anything like that.  It was just that you almost feel like you should know someone before looking through their pictures.  You can tell that there is a story behind each and every one, and you can see a family's love through the years.  I also found myself dreading each passing year because I knew that she would die young in her early 20s.  That last Christmas was sad to see in pictures because they did not know that it would be the last.  I mean, with an illness, you have a chance to prepare, but with a sudden death you just don't know.  There are happy pictures, then the life is no more.  The next picture you see is of a tombstone.  It was kind of a depressing feeling.

There really isn't anything profound that I am trying to say.  I am sure that if I talked to the stranger's family, they would have something special to say about each picture.  I know that the friend did.  Plus, I was a pretty cute little kid (except the picture where I look like my brother ... that one was scary.).