The Black and White Thirteen

Black and white photos carry a potent wallop of poignancy and nostalgic feeling, don’t you think? Nearly any black and white photo makes me wistful, longing for an earlier, better time.

For example, remember when Dax Montana stopped by?

Oh, Dax. You nearly put my eye out with that, ah, outfit. Who would have thought a breast could carry such momentum.

Yes, those were the days.

Below the cut: thirteen (plus one) slices of the past. I’ve pared down the files as much as I dare, but dial-up users, you’ve been warned.

Mom and Dad, courting:

This little photo, I carried it around in my wallet for years, eventually realizing it would fall apart if I didn’t stuff it into my album. They look so happy here, so full of potential. No disillusionment here, no bitterness. And look how little body hair my dad has. What happened to me? I’m an effing bear compared to him.

A few months later (who knows?) they got married. Here’s the photo they used on their thank you cards:

The caption reads: To tell you in this simple way The Thanks that words alone can’t say. I like the idea of putting a photo on a wedding thank you note. Regular thank you notes end up in the trash, I’m sure, but no one likes to throw out photos. I wonder how many of these are still out there, stuffed into photo albums across the country?

It didn’t take them long to make my sis:

Here’s the caption, written on the back in my mother’s hand:

April 1953. I bought her that toy she is holding isn’t that cute she is getting to be a big girl she looks cuter every day.

And she is a cutie:

My bro came next:

It took me a reprehensibly long time to figure out who wrote the caption to this one.

Before I was conceived

Let’s just say my handwriting has changed a lot over the years. (I’m thinking: Huh? Before who was conceived? It looks like my brother’s writing, but that makes no sense at all!)

Here’s the whole family, minus my dad. I’m the larva in the stroller:

I didn’t want to leave my father out, so here you go:

Sis, any idea about the date on that photo? I’m thinking 1960s. And the bow tie . . . do you ever remember him wearing a bow tie? He probably peeled out of that thing the second the photographer finished.

Here’s my grandfather, whom I’ve blogged about ad nauseum lately, and my grandmother, posing in front of our house in Southern California. March, 1962:

The porch behind them is a nice bland shade of gray, the way my dad liked it. When we all went across country in ’62, my grandfather (in his role as house-watcher) decided it would look much better RED. I’m told my dad was livid, but it took him several years to paint over the red.

The bushes played host to numerous spiders. As a kid, I spent many hours catching flies and feeding them to spiders. I wonder if that qualifies as part of the sociopathy triad? (It hardly matters. I never wet the bed, nor was I a habitual fire-starter.) But all that came later. Diapers came first:

and more diapers . . .

Looks like I have a pantload. See how Sis is breathing through her mouth to avoid the stench of moi?

In this next one, I’m ten or eleven months old. My sis can fill in the details. She probably remembers whose stairs these are (we’re in Massachusetts here, that’s all I know). That’s my bro, looking bored.

Kindergarten. Guess which one is me.

I’m not sure what motivated me to pose with a paint can.

Behind me is my garden. I think those are tomatoes. I used to grow not-half-bad corn and radishes, too, not because I like radishes, but because any dumbass can grow them.

I still don’t know how to stand up straight, by the way, nor can I sit like a normal human being. When I die, I want to will my pelvis to science so someone can figure out why the hell I’m like this.

I’ll leave you with me and a critter. I named him Cyrus Molybdenum. Can you say geek?

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For those of you who can’t get enough of ME, and I know you are legion, here’s a link to Thirteen Ages of ME

Leave a message in the comments, and I’ll give you some cool linky love below.

Zeus’s 13 Funniest Kitty Quotes

13 Things about JAM

Barbara Bush Middle School & more from Darla

If Heather hangs out here more often, she’s in for a BIG surprise

Don’t piss Trish off, whatever you do

D.