Treasures

Mom and Dad kept meticulous, up-to-date and well-labeled photo albums over the years when we were kids. Every graduation, every First Communion, every birthday -- and there were a lot of them -- is carefully documented in volumes and volumes of photos albums, now stored on really high shelves at Mom's house.

The apple, apparently, does not fall far from the tree. And these are only 2001 through 2008, the years Mistah and I were on the road.

Anyway, despite all that scrupulous organization, sometimes one is still lucky enough to come across a shoebox full of loose papers and old letters and odd, un-photo-albumed snapshots -- a shoebox of unfiled Treasures. Which is what happened on Sunday, at Mom's.

A few weeks ago I talked about our family's annual rite of posing for a Christmas card photo, and I bemoaned a missing one:

There's a really great Christmas card photo of all of us in Korea just a few weeks after Jacquie was born. It's the only photo -- out of all the thousands and thousands of them -- where Dad actually looks overwhelmed. It's hanging on the wall in Mom's bedroom and I don't have a copy of it. That, however, will soon change.

Well, here it is:

About this photo, Jacquie commented:

I love that Korea photo that you speak of. I stared at it for so long last month when I stood there making copies of your Westy manuals. Dad looks shellshocked, but mom just takes it in stride.

Let's she if she's right:

Yep, Dad is looking shellshocked, although I just love the four hands, especially Julie's on Dad's knee . . .

. . . and Mom is taking it in stride, and looking awfully glamorous while doing so, even with a squawking Jacquie on her lap.

And the Big Sister Brigade:

Oh, we're doing just fine.

Jacquie also reminded me of another missing Christmas card photo:

There was one year when Julie, Jane and I ALL donned the flight suits with cowl necks. I remember taking the photo in Kev & Cheri's backyard, we were standing on rocks.

I comment-replied:

Dang, where *is* that triple flight suit shot? Why do I not have it? I *love* that year's photo because I'm wearing the most awesome green corduroy jumper *ever*.

Well, here is that one:

Jacquie's right: Julie, Jane and Jacquie were in fact all wearing flight suits. They even might say they were rocking those flight suits, but I'd have to disagree because flight suits are a really really bad fashion choice. I, however, am totally right about my wearing the most awesome green corduroy jumper *ever*.

Ever.

I pulled a few more treasures out of the box:

Julie and Dad, with Dad, as Julie put it, "at his swarthiest." I commented (I do a lot of commenting, a lot) that Julie was just the perfect example of babyhood with that round bald head and big blue eyes and perfect eyebrows.

Julie replied:

I know I wasn't always a joy in dad's life*, but I was at that age. He loved to tell me about our visits out to the garden to look at the flowers, my big eyes taking it all in.

(*don't listen to her: there was just that one decade -- or maybe two -- when she was a rebel)

And this one is brilliant for so many reasons:

I don't know what I like more, the rosary around my neck or Dad drinking creme de menthe. I'm channelling Dad in later years -- and actually not all that many years later -- when I say, "Blech."

And finally, the pièce de résistance:

The red, smiley-face dress with choker attached. Sigh. This, my friends, was the Best. Dress. Ever. There was no debate about what to wear on picture day in 3rd grade.

It was my favorite dress of all time.

It still is.