Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Looking Back

This is a photo taken in Spring 1949. That's my aunt in the shorts and saddle oxfords. She is 17. That's me on her lap, not yet one. The swing was on our farm in a very large Pecan tree.The field behind us belonged to us (or, actually, my granddad as did the whole farm and house). I think I see some cattle out there. Looking back over sixty-five years. I worshiped this aunt, but I'm so small here that I don't think I'm very sure of her as yet. I have that dark hair like my mother. It is weird but I can almost recognize this baby in this blurry picture as me. I remember the swing from later when it was still there and I could swing on it myself. My aunt looks young but the face is definitely hers. She is the only one of my dad and his siblings still alive. She's recovering from a shoulder replacement and the fall that precipitated it. She sounded good on the phone a couple of days ago.

The end of the year is a time for looking back, isn't it? I've been fumbling through old pictures and scanning them. I got this one out of a decaying photo album of my mother's a few years ago and put it and the other pictures in these non-reactive sleeves.I'd never noticed the saddle oxfords until I was processing this scan.

Taking stock of 2014 I'm thinking that I failed to accomplish much. But I did scan this picture and discover those shoes. And that's something.

No comments: