General Chat

A few of my thoughts on memories. what are yours?

I have 69 years of shared memories to draw on, maybe 82 of my own if I go right back to my childhood. But 69 are mostly good, some are great and bear looking at again and again. I have been lucky, have visited some great places, had a lot of fun.

Of course there are some not so good memories, some sad, some uncomfortable maybe. But mainly they are good, and all are part of the tapestry of my life.

I have photos and diaries, especially holiday diaries to refresh those memories. And I appreciate that, Yes my memories make me happy and realise how lucky I have been. But somehow, sometimes it is difficult to enjoy memories if you can’t talk about them.

When I made albums from photos and wrote holiday diaries, I always envisaged that, in our later lives, My other half and I would be looking at them together, sharing and reliving the memories and that sometimes makes the memories hard to think about. Now he is not here to share them.

I went through all my photos awhile ago and made up several scrap books dividing them into holidays xmas etc and writing the years underneath.

i also have many happy memories of when i was younger but also some unhappy ones as we all do.

I have shown the books to my children as it keep the memories alive and grandparents and aunties/uncles etc who have sadly passed away when they were young.

I know with smart phones we dont print out the photos as we use to but i still have done for special occasions as its nice to look back on.

Newspaper clippings of my children's first day at school as was in our local paper.

My son is 30 this year and I have actually been looking for a young photo of him to put in the local paper again!! im sure he will be horrified but....has to be done lol

Good luck with that Florence. I remember getting a photo of the orphanage my Mum grew up in and showing it to her, she pushed it away from me with discust that I knew I had the right one.

Ann, I do understand when you say that memories can make you sad, even though you are remembering happy times.
Like me, you can look back on some wonderful shared times during a happy marriage, but the sadness comes with realising that THAT piece of music or THAT particular place are yours alone now to remember and although family may know that the music or place is special to you, they cannot share the memory that made it so.
Perhaps it's the turning of the calendar onto a new year that makes us reflect more on what has gone before and maybe wonder what lies ahead in the coming year, especially as January itself has such sad memories for us.