The Picture

Welcome to the walk today.  You know how you have heard that things go around and come around again..........well, that may not be the exact quote but I thought I would tell you about something I had to happen many years ago, dismissed and hoped to never see it again.....

My senior year in high school was 1958.  All senior females were photographed with a black drape across our bare shoulders.  A few weeks later we were given four proofs to view and pick one that we wanted to be placed in the annual.  I picked one that was a front view and I had my usual smile.  I never posed for a picture without smiling, usually showing my teeth.  I was proud of my smile and had always been complimented on how happy I looked.

Imagine my surprise when the annual came out and the ONE picture I would never have picked for a permanent record in the annual was the one when I had NO smile and an expression on my face that I was probably caught off guard as the camera clicked.  I don't know how this happened other than maybe I had chosen to swallow at that particular moment in time.  Anyway there it was......never to be corrected and left to memory only......I hoped. 

After I graduated, I forgot the incident and moved on.  I had many goals to accomplish during the next three to five years so that picture was of little or no consequence to me any more.  Good Riddance!

My life moved forward, I completed a three-year diploma nursing program, became a licensed registered nurse, moved back to my home with my parents, found a job in the local hospital, and began to focus on other important photographs that included my engagement picture to Paul and later, my wedding pictures.  The high school senior picture that I hated long ago was replaced. 

So, if that is so, then why did I choose to bring it up and share it with you today?  You see, I never anticipated social media in the twenty-first century!  I honestly did not think beyond the twentieth century.  But now we have an amazing device that we call a cell phone, which is really a misnomer because it is actually a hand-held computer.  Yes, I can make contact with others through the cell-phone in the computer, but it does so much more.  This amazing device will allow people everywhere, not just my hometown, my state, and the United States of America, BUT the entire WORLD to once again view that horrible picture of me that I thought was gone!

I opened the social media page called Facebook last week and discovered that a former classmate had posted it.  Again, I shoved that image to the lowest recesses of my memory area in my brain and accepted that it would be removed in three days.  Relax, I said to myself, most of the people who knew you then are either dead or in a demented brain state.  Forget it!  So I did!

Well, this past Sunday one of my nephews who lives about as far away as you can get from me and still be in the US, was going through all his collection of pictures and guess what?  You guessed it....there it was again.  This thing will not go away!

I decided to go back and look at that picture again.  The one on the facebook page.  This time I viewed it through my almost eighty-year-old eyes. My memory had continued to remember how I saw the picture as a seventeen, almost eighteen year old. That stored memory held fast to the shallowness of appearances at that young period of my life.  I stared at my picture for a long time, and as I did I added all those memories these past sixty years.  This time I saw a young girl who was very naive, and who unknowing at that time would make choices that would help direct a path.for the remainder of her life. I wondered to myself, would I go back and change things, knowing what I know now?

  Oh, I thought, how young I was.  My hair was long and thick and the style was pretty.  I did miss my smile but I had lovely young eyes. My eyebrows were natural, not growing in different directions as they do now.  My skin was clear and not any evidence of those wrinkles that would surly be there in the future.  My shoulders were round and firm, not bony and skinny as they are now.  Another thing I noticed was an air of confidence that seemed to jump out of the still photo.  The girl in that picture taken so long ago knew what she wanted to do with her life.  She had already selected her professional vocation, her mate and she knew what she could accomplish because she was busy setting goals and she was not afraid of new challenges.

Would I go back?  Would I make changes?  NO , not a single thing, because I would not have my amazing family and all those wonderful people and experiences to look back on.  The moment the camera shutter clicked, My life and all my experiences, good and bad began.  I  have been given and received the beautiful gift of memory that is so important in my life today.

Oh, my, I thought..................".beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder"

Just Pondering........................................................