photographs

Ebba Forsberg once sang, "Give me a photograph and I'll hold it to my heart."

I was talking with a friend and it'd been a while since we had chatted. Some things have changed and some have not since that time, but we always revert back to a time in a photograph. Funny how those things work. They really do capture a moment in time, preserving it. And even when they fade, we sometimes have them etched in our memories.

I've said this before, and I know I'm not the first, nor will I be the last. Our most prized possessions are not just what we have, but what we have that no one else can take away. Only time and death have control over these, but while we are the custodians of our lives, it's our experiences, our memories, these etched photographs in our hearts and minds that we treaure, and to a degree, help make us who and what we are.

Sometimes, someone I have not seen for years, let alone heard from... I'd run across their picture and I automatically associate a memory with them through that image. A silly memory. A serious memory. A memory nonetheless. Sitting in the neighborhood playground, chatting as she smoked. Water in the background andbeing with an old friend. Or, a group of friends huddled together after a theater performance.

I've been called a photoslut before, especially for posing with girls, some of whom i've nver met before, and chances are, will never meet again. But those other times, with people who have come in and out of my life, or have stayed...

give me these photographs, and i will hold them to my heart.