Visiting the past

If you're on Facebook, you're probably aware of the newest "thing" -- posting pictures of yourself as a baby, a toddler, a dorky teen. I've always loved old pictures. They put life in perspective. Whenever I'm annoyed or bothered with someone, I try to remember, "This person was an innocent kid once." Ha. I know it's weird, but it helps, and evokes less giggling than picturing someone naked.

While looking through old pictures (and stumbling on some high school photos, one of which I used in my last post), I noticed that they made me feel pretty happy. Sometimes, I get so stuck in my head about present anxieties, or I jump ahead to worry about the future. Looking at old pictures provides a nice moment to pause and reflect on childhood simplicity, rebellious adolescence (and by rebellious, I mean the short shorts that earned me detention...once), confusing young adulthood. Even pictures from trying times make me smile, mostly because I remember how I couldn't imagine moving past those times, and now I see that I did.

Here are a few I was happy to find:

This is me with our first cat, PJ. I loved this cat. I also loved sitting in that position (still do).

This is a professional, studio portrait that my sister and I are still trying to understand. We are posed with the family dogs, Max (doberman) and Casey (labrador retriever). Casey is the only one who looks good in this photo. I'm rockin' the white high-tops. My sister's got the feather bangs. And the denim shirts...oh the denim shirts.

And these are from one of our last "family trips." We went to London and Paris. This was about 7 or 8 years ago, I think. I was out of treatment pretty recently, if I remember correctly. We just had such a good time. I'll always remember that trip.

I'm going to dare to start a photo meme (is that what he kids are calling it?) and ask that you (yes YOU) post three or four of your old pictures.

How does it make you feel to look at photos?

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Today's gratitude:

1. The fridge is really, really full. I'm always a little overwhelmed after going to the grocery store. I'll make a flexible dinner plan for the week and try to just remember to use all the perishables :)

2. I had a good time with my friend yesterday. We had lunch at this cute bakery (and I discovered that I do like goat cheese, which I didn't know), and saw "It's Complicated." It was fun to catch up.

3. Clean clothes and clean condo. I don't know if I could start the week off sane if I didn't get these chores done.

4. I've actually felt good this weekend. I woke up yesterday NOT feeling like I got hit by a truck. I have my annual physical tomorrow so I'll talk to the doctor about this depression thing.

5. Computer nerd time with Larry. I'm going to join him in playing Everquest in a few minutes here. He's so lucky ;)