Photo A Day: Telephone

My first thought when I saw today’s Photo A Day subject was, “Well, that’s easy enough!” And my second thought was, “Wait a minute, how can I take a picture of my phone when what I use to take pictures with is my phone?” Fortunately, my third thought was, “Phew, it’s a good thing that we still have a landline, so I have a bunch of other telephones that I can take a picture of!”

As you can see, although we do have a landline, the phone itself gets kind of shoved to the back, behind various assorted cooking utensils and accoutrement and a pile of charging electronics. It’s still around, but it’s mostly forgotten and neglected. It’s headed toward obsolescence, but it hasn’t quite gotten there yet.

There is a reason we still have a landline, though. We still have it because it’s a convenient backup in case we ever have a problem with our phones – if the nearest cell tower goes down, or the power goes out when the phones aren’t charged, or if (as often happens to me) I just can’t find my blasted cell phone. How could I call my phone to find my phone if I didn’t have a phone?!?? The technology may be outdated, but it’s still useful.

In some ways, people are like that, too. As they get older and their knowledge and experience begins to seem obsolete to the younger generations, we forget that they still have a purpose, they can still function just fine, and that their history is important. Just because old technology doesn’t work the same way as new, or as quickly, or perhaps it doesn’t have quite as many function, doesn’t mean it’s useless. And neither are people. There’s often a certain nostalgic charm in older technology; there’s definitely a charm in the knowledge, experience, and life stories of older people. Let’s not forget that. Especially since someday (probably sooner than we think), someone from a younger generation will be asking us, “What’s a telephone?”

Telephone.

Family History

Tomorrow is the big Centennial Gala for Herb’s family’s dance studio. 100 years ago, his 16-year-old grandmother opened a dance studio in Boston. Little did she know that she would manage that studio for 44 years, and then her youngest daughter would manage it for another 44 years, and then her granddaughter would take over. Not only her children, but her grand-children, great-grandchildren, and even a few great-great-grandchildren would learn to dance there. Some of her students would go on to become professional dancers, others to teach dance and open studios of their own. It is a rich history and I hope that someday Ryan will want to learn about it.

Family history is an important part of every family. The stories we tell of our parents and grandparents when they were young, the tales of family vacations, the goofy things we did ourselves as children – these are all part of the tapestry that a family weaves over time. As Ryan grows up, no doubt we will tell him the story of my dad nailing a pancake to a tree, of his Uncle Glen jumping out of a moving car to retrieve a football, of Bammy knocking Pappy’s trombone off its stand the first time they met, of the mice in the suitcase when my parents went camping, his sister telling Daddy “Someone’s looking at me” on her first encounter with wildlife…and no doubt by the time he’s old enough to want to hear these stories, they’ll be even more to tell.

"Daddy, someone's looking at me..."

And I like to think that someday, he might tell his own children some of those stories. And they’ll tell their children. And so on, and so on…