Resolution

It's a simple concept, resolve to do something and do it, pretty straightforward.  So why do I cringe at the word?  Why is it the minute I make a resolution I set out to break it, if it's a New Year's resolution.  I think it is quite possibly my strong dislike of schedules that causes the madness.  The whole you will make resolutions on the 1st really annoys me.  The year before last I outsmarted myself and made my resolution in November 2010.  Guess what?  I'm still keeping it!  I know it's because it wasn't a scheduled January 1st resolution.  

So here it is, middle of January, and I'm thinking a goal would be nice to go with that November 2010 one (that I will definitely continue, after all, now it's become a lifestyle and not a resolution).    This year my middle of January resolution is to take one photo with me in it each month, that would be this month at the top of the post.  There are literally under 20 photos of me from the years 1990-now, that is less than one a year and most of those are from last year.  While I hate being in photos, I know it is important for my kids to be able to look back.  Photos can reconnect you with things you would have otherwise forgotten.  

A couple of days ago I was going through really old family photos and people long gone were brought back to me.  With the photos of family I knew, I could hear their laughter and remember our stories together as if it was yesterday.  With the photos of people I barely knew or didn't know at all, I was flooded with questions that I know I'll never get the answers to.  I'll never know what card game Great Grandma was playing or what made her smile so big that her whole face lit up, or what bait Grandpa used to catch the fish that was worthy of a shutter click in those days when photos were so few.  It was the little things, little lost answers.  I don't want to leave my children, their children, the children beyond that with little lost answers.  I don't want the phrase, "if only you could have seen her, you are so much like her" to be how I'm spoken of and remembered, leaving someone else to wonder.   Now, I know no one may ever go looking, no one may ever care but if they do, I want to leave them something to find.

One photo a month, that's not too daunting of a task.