I mentioned awhile back that I wanted to bring all of my photos, as in all of them from all time that I still have negatives for, into the digital world so they can be backed up locally and in the cloud. I've been able to get most of the way into 2002 at this point. It's not that I want to dwell on the past, but I think it's important to have a record of it. It reveals a lot about who you are today.
Naturally 2002 was a drastically different time for me, in a lot of ways. It's almost as if I had a previous life. Stephanie and I were happily married and having a lot of good times. We took little trips, she took goofy self portraits, I worked tirelessly on my Web sites. I know we had our issues even then, but overall life seemed to have a general order to it.
I think I've arrived at a place where I'm happy we had the time that we did. While I still put the decision to split mostly on Steph, I'm not bitter or angry about it. Aside from a couple of brief moments here and there, I never really was. It obviously sucks that it didn't work out, but we had some good times and I have wonderful memories. I'm genuinely happy for her pursuing the things she wants out of life in Colorado.
Another thing that comes out of the photos is the drastic changing in friend circles. The only people in those photos that I still have any contact with are Kara, who I really barely knew back then, and Kristin and Rob, who were dating at the time. Tim and Lois have been there all along too, thank God. I still talk to some of the volleyball kids now and then too. Even more weird are pics of Mike and Artemisa, who I'm lucky to see once a year but we always just pick up where we left off. Where did everyone else go?
Stephanie's friends started to flake out on her before she even moved. One guy in particular pretty much dropped off the face of the earth, while her best girl friend moved and cut off ties to humanity. Our maid of honor cut off ties after a misunderstanding with Steph, and my best man Frank I haven't heard from since our wedding.
My friends from various jobs moved, moved on or just stopped making an effort. Some of the coaster dorks grew up or did other things. It's pretty wild how all of that change went down in just a few years.
I guess it has really made me think about who my real friends are. I have hundreds of acquaintances, but people I'd call friends are a lot fewer in number. And actually, I'm OK with that. There's a short list of people that I feel some lasting connection to. They don't make a career of talking about me to other people (as many acquaintances do), they may not live near me, they give me a random shout now and then, we can bullshit about anything... they're always there in some way.
The last three years have served as a remarkable transition period for me. When I look at those photos, it's hard to get my head around just how much things have changed. It might be easy for someone to be brought down by something like that, but I am so thankful for every one of those days. I find myself reaching out now to the friends who helped me through that transition, because they were instrumental in helping me. I'm willing to work my ass off to maintain those friendships.
I just got to the end of the first of "the Diana years," which reminds me of how unexpected things can change, and how yet another person can enter the scene and immediately have impact on your life. Diana coming into my life seems too random to be random, but whatever higher power or cosmic forces you believe in, it has been amazing.
Indeed the collective experience of my life has taught me that other people can enrich your life when you're open to it and willing to learn from their experiences. You don't need a destination in mind for your life, you just need to take in the experience and influence of others to make the journey extraordinary. To me, that's what it's all about.
After my first Powerbook died I let it sit on a shelf in the closet for a couple years while I decided if I wanted to spend the money to have the data recovered from it. There wasn't really anything on there I needed, but it did contain the entire photo collection of my college years.
In the end I decided to bite the bullet and shell out the money. One look through everything I got back and I knew I had made a good decision. While I didn't need every last photo and and I don't talk to most of the people in them any more, the memories and grounding those shots provide are priceless. Pictures really can serve as a good way to show how much transition comes about in life.
Your prior post motivated me to pull out my slides and begin to transfer to digital files as well. Like you, a lot of memories were brought back and more than a few "wonder where he/she is now?" In my case the memories were all pleasant and several provided smiles, tears and a few laughs for friends of more than 40 years! Others are gone now and quite a few were just lives that crossed in the night and we moved on, but all were important to me in some way.
The last paragraph of your post says it all ....it's all about the collective journey with others at your side