The mixed emotions of a funeral and some photo organizing tips

Rose Hayes (1919-2009)

Funerals are such bittersweet events. The bitter, of course, comes from the loss of a loved one, dear friend or even the most casual of acquaintances. The loss is tempered, though, by the celebration of the life of the departed.

My family went through the experience this week as we honored the matriarch of my wife’s family – her mother, Rose Hayes. While we’ll all miss Rose greatly, we were also reminded of how much joy she brought to others in her 90 years.

Stories about Rose and her family flowed freely as relatives and friends gathered from across the country to say goodbye. Besides the stories familiar to so many of us, many others had been long forgotten or seldom told in recent years. The sharing of so much family history was a powerful tribute to a strong lady.

Our family was, perhaps, better prepared than most in that we had prodded Rose for much of her family history in recent years. Still, it was sadly obvious that we had lost more than her generous heart and radiant smile.

Although Rose’s material world had shrunk greatly as she transitioned from a three-bedroom house to apartment to assisted living to nursing care over the past dozen years, she still left a sizable cache of personal drawings, writings and photographs.

While we are grateful for the family history bounty she has left us, I have a few suggestions regarding family photographs that you might find helpful:

• Label them. At the very least, put a date on them and identify the people in the photo. Listing the location and event is also helpful.
• Don’t bury the information. Rose did a great job of labeling most of her photos. But she then glued them into a photo album, making it very difficult to extract them with the information on the back readable.
• Don’t use terms like mom and dad. Use their names instead. Relationships won’t be that clear to future generations.

One final suggestion: if you regard something as important, make certain your family knows about it. Many important family items end up in the trash simply because they are not recognized.

Writing prompt for the day: Do you have your family photos organized and clearly labeled?

Author Larry Lehmer's book about Dick Clark and American Bandstand --  Bandstandland: How Dancing Teenagers Took Over America and Dick Clark Took Over Rock & Roll --is available from Sunbury Press. His book about the last tour of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens -- The Day the Music Died -- is available at Amazon.

 

 

Comments

[Sherry Borzo]

Great, great post Larry. Can't tell you the number of photos I've gone through that are not marked. Sadly, many of those happen to be mine! It is overwhelming to start the project. It is a terrific reason to let a professional help you get it done. Left to our own devices we procrastinate. Or is that just me?

[Cindy]

Larry - I agree completely! My Mom and I began organizing my paternal Grandmother's photos during the summer. Many were 'pasted' in books and others were simply stacked in a box. We decided to label the ones we could while consulting with Dad on his memories of the family. Then we began organizing them in photo safe books (at my endless nagging). My Dad passed away during the week of Christmas and Mom and I have just this week began to work again on the process. Realizing that he's now gone and cannot help with any of the identifying is heartbreaking and frustrating at the same time. Getting those photos identified as soon as they're found is more important than many realize. Thanks for bringing attention to this!