Conversation with My Wife (68)
“Photographs are the signposts that lead us back to our memories.”
My wife sometimes catches up on sleep when the alarm goes off “in the dead of night” and I go downstairs to exercise. But since she switched to a smartphone, sometimes the seductive call of the bright screen sucks her out of bed.
DEB: I got up just to do a quick check of my texts to make sure there wasn’t a change in plans, and I got hooked on this Medium post about a daughter and her dad.
ME: Ah! The one by Dan Moore?
DEB: Yes!
ME: Dan’s a good writer. He did a great piece on his new wife, too.
ME: But then, I’m a sucker for sentimental stories.
DEB: The father-daughter story was just very… (starts to get moist-eyed)
Deb’s father died several years ago; her mother died last year. Little things can trigger memories, though.
ME: Yeah, I told Dan he really aggravated my allergies with that one. I also told him we’re working on a memory book for my mother, like in his story, only on paper instead of her iPad, because Mom can’t deal with swiping anymore.
We’re just throwing together a bunch of photos — family members, places we’ve lived, pets long dead. No organization; my mother’s brain can’t process organization very well anyway these days, so random photos work as well as any.
At my sister’s suggestion, we’ll also put the photos on an electronic frame so they can cycle automatically, but I’m not wild about that because if someone sees a picture they like it’s gone in five seconds (or whatever the preset interval is). On the other hand, everything is automatic and takes no effort once the setup is complete.
Someone said that “Photos are the signposts that lead us to our memories,” but I don’t think these signposts will lead my mother to any destination. But maybe a few might, or maybe the journey will be worth it.
