throwback thursday

 I gotta tell you, it was hard to choose from the 3 posts I found closest to this date back in February of 2009, the month I decided to draw from for this installment of don't-forget-about-the-great-stuff-I-already-posted-when-I-have-nothing-new-to-say. F

It was really hard not to choose this one, with it's gloriously weird photos of my children and dog and bathroom remodel.

And it was really hard not to choose this one where I question my judgement and general parenting capabilities with a throwback title.

But in the end, I simply could not resist the opportunity to revisit this one:

Thursday, February 19, 2009

in the den

I can’t look at this photo without smiling. It’s been propped in a vertical file on my desk for ages, ever since it fell off of some silly identity poster that I had to make for one reason or another many years ago. It was a very fitting entry for that poster, it expresses the roots of my identity pretty well, I think.

I love the photograph itself – the square shape and white border easily distinguish it as an archive from the 70s. And if you needed more proof of that, well hello wall-to-wall orange shag carpet!

I love the girl, I love being the girl. The unbearable cuteness, the messy braids, that grin, and Lord help me, that outfit! Oh, what I would give to have those clothes in my girl’s drawers.

I love the room, the den. Those built in shelves with the albatross of a tv that you had to actually touch to change channels. Those shelves that held so many treasures.. that Japanese tea set that you see up there above the funky angled desk lamp was set up out of reach in 1973, but in later years it was banged around with abandon by the next generation. I wish we could see Beethoven’s bust or that weird three-faced golden dog. The cabinet by the tv that first housed a reel to reel tape recorder, which eventually retired to make room for the CD player.

I love the house that enfolded that den. The house of my memories, the house I visit in my dreams, the house of my childhood. I wish we could have our upcoming family reunion old-school style, with Dad hauling kids down Jackson in his lawn mower trailer contraption. But I think the one we are planning will be great – how can we miss, all inhabiting the same acre or so of land? The Poconos are not going to know what hit them.