Old Pictures 1

Going through old pictures has always been one of my favorite things to do, so going home this spring break meant I would be digging through old pictures once again. My mom used to get every picture we took developed and she organized them by season and year, which made it a lot easier to look through them. Although I have looked at the pictures dozens of times, I still manage to find pictures I’ve never seen before then. I didn’t take as many pictures as I would have hoped, but I did manage to get some good ones while looking.

I’ll start with this gem of a picture of yours truly; it’s one of my favorite pictures of myself because I think it describes my essence well. One of the most interesting parts about looking back at pictures of myself is attempting to recognize myself now back when I was a toddler. I used to think I have always looked the same, and I think there is still truth to that, but I don’t see it as much anymore. You can’t see my dimples in the picture and I think that is why I look so different. I was one of the happiest children out there and I think this is the photo to show my happiness. Also, I do see myself as a queen, so you could say the picture also shows my personality, both then and now.

This picture is of my family all together, which includes my parents and brother, along with my mom’s best friend Jennifer and her daughters, Maddy and Abby. In my travel blog, I talked a little about them when I described all the trips we went on with family friends of ours. Every summer, we travelled with them, whether it was to a different state or a Caribbean cruise. This picture is from when we went on a trip to Pennsylvania to go skiing at the Seven Springs Ski Resort. Once we all got to high school, we stopped going on trips together because of time restrictions, but they have become my family nonetheless. I have always wanted sisters and Maddy and Abby have become that for me, as well as Jennifer becoming my second mom. I will forever be thankful for the memories I made with my so called “family”, the bonds we created and the pictures we look so the memories can last a lifetime.

Moving to the topic of family, these are two of my favorite pictures of my dad and me because I think they accurately describe our relationship. My dad is a very serious and unemotional person, at least that’s how he appears to most of the outside world. So having the first picture to represent what his personality truly is like is something very special to me. I get a lot of my silliness from my dad, which most people do not believe, and that is why this picture sticks with me. Growing up, I was a total daddy’s girl and wanted to do everything he was doing. The second picture is an accurate depiction of what I did as a kid. I basically followed him around when he was coaching and pretended as though I knew what sports were. My dad has a lot of stress on him nowadays, so looking back at pictures like these remind me of the impact he has had on my life and all he has taught me.

Next is my mom, the first picture is one I just saw for the first time over spring break, and couldn’t stop looking at when I did find it. This is my mom on her wedding day and when I showed it to her, she rolled her eyes and said, “That’s the cheesiest picture ever”. Despite her statement, this is my favorite picture of her. It was on one of the happiest days of her life and she looked beautiful doing it. I also think this picture is funny to compare to me because we do not look much alike, but if you look at a picture of my brother, they are identical. The second photo is a more recent photo, but it is still from at least five years ago. My mom and I have a unique relationship that has gotten stronger over time, which it usually seems to be the opposite. I never fail to tell her I love her, and sometimes she gets annoyed with it (I don’t blame her), but she will always be the best mom ever so I constantly have to tell her!

Lastly in the family is my brother, Tommy. Thank goodness my mom made us take hundreds of pictures as children because he hates taking them now. There are so many gems I could share but this first one is unique to me. When I first looked at the picture, it was amazing how different we are from each other just by glancing at us. But, the more I studied the photo, the more similarities I saw between us. I think that describes our personalities as well because we are polar opposites in many ways, but I also think if you dig deep enough, there are many similarities as well. The second picture is honestly embarrassing for me to put on the internet, but my mom has already posted it to Facebook so it isn’t a big deal. I think this picture perfectly describes our underlying similarities because despite this picture being taken in the early hours of the morning in the freezing cold, we both still found a way to be silly. Attempting to understand each other because we are so different has proven difficult for us, but we always bring out the best in each other, whether we truly are similar or not.

That’s the amazing thing about pictures: they are a split second in time but for many of them, you know exactly what happened before and after it was taken. A lot of my friends and family members get annoyed with the number of pictures I take, but there is such a power to pictures that is overlooked. They show an entire history of someone’s life and through them, you can even get an idea of the type of person they are. I am hoping to do some more of these because I have an endless supply of pictures to choose from and so many more people to talk about as well. So, in the future, keep an eye out for some more of these blogs if you enjoyed!