My husband and I both at the age of one.
My dress is one that my maternal grandfather picked out for me. It was white with yellow trim - it hangs in the guest bedroom now.
I find old photos fascinating for so many reasons. Photos of children are particularly compelling when you know the adult. It is fascinating to realize that this child in the image is the person you know but the child knows very little of what he is or what he will become.
It makes one think of the twists and turns life takes - decisions made and paths taken. One considers the points of no return that make us who we are - the points of no return that make our loved ones who they are. It helps appreciate the complexity of life and how beautiful life is because of that complexity and yet how painful it is.
These children are us - my husband and I with two children of our own. The memories are our's alone - summed up in the file cabinet of our mind - held in these frail bodies. The twenty years before hubby met me are his alone - I can only see them faintly and certainly not clearly. The nineteen years before I met him belong to me - they make me who I was - who he fell in love with - who I am but he cannot comprehend them.
Odd - we marry strangers and we become one. We share our lives and yet tucked away like a box in the attic is the person they met - the person we met - the person that seemed worth getting to know.
It is strange - we are ordained to leave our parents and cleave to one another. I think it was Steinbeck I read who wrote how cleaving means two very opposite things to tear apart and to bind tightly together and how words fascinated him because of those contradictions.
What part of cleaving is tearing apart - what part of marriage is separation? I think it is more than leaving our parents - there is a separation of the individual from one's self as you become something more - part of a we. A 'we' that begets a family and precedes to continue to march through the generations filling the earth.
The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.
Have you ever held onto a Word?
I apologize for the meander...
It is so very interesting how our childhoods are so separate from our spouse's.
ReplyDeleteI also think it is interesting how we can see the resemblance in a childhood picture of an adult, but how it is so hard to figure out how a child is going to look when they age. It's all a great big surprise I guess.
My husband had a stinky childhood.
ReplyDeleteMine was 'Leave It to Beaver' but without the money.
I think he copes better than I do.
Or, maybe he just has more highly developed powers of dissociating.
Oh, never apologize for such--I LOVED this!
ReplyDeleteI love your photos - it's very fun looking at childhood photos - thanks! Very thoughtful post - and very true.
ReplyDeleteThe photos from the apple orchard and pumpkin farm are wonderful - and I loved hearing about them.
Hi M
ReplyDeleteI don't have your e-mail so this will be a very long post to say thank you x1000! I received your amazing parcel today. I feel so very special and so very spoilt. I will go tomorrow in the light of day and hang my wind spinner where I can see it from this window - how I love buttons and they are perfect on this. The felt quiltie is just beautiful and matches my room so there it will hang and 'Oh Glory' makes me smile - a special spot will be found. Thank you.
I read your previous post and understood so I will stop talking and send a word to up to our Lord and hug to you.
No apologies for meandering. 'Tis your blog. :-)
ReplyDeleteMay I see something in a tiny bit different light?
"a separation of the individual from one's self as you become something more - part of a we"
I don't see it as any separation from one's self... I don't see it as two individuals, becoming one 'we'. That has a nice ring to it, but it's humanly impossible.
I prefer the idea of 2 people going into a union. And it is that union, which they 'give' for. It's the thriving of that union, which they curtail some of their own wishes, for. It's that union, which they 'sacrifice' for, when they sacrifice.
Not for the other. Not for a sort of a hybrid coupling of a man and a woman. For the union, freely gone into, by a still very individual man and a still very individual woman.
Naturally, I didn't think of this. Joseph Campbell did.
Mari-Nanci
And my Daily City Photo blog is at..
Photos-City-Mine
we sound very similar. I mean thinking about this topic. I'm totally fascinated with it.
ReplyDeleteThis post is beautiful! I love reading your thoughts. And those pictures are darling :-)
ReplyDeleteI too find old pictures fascinating.
I'm going to link this up to Small Treasure Tuesdays so other people see it as well :-)