Specific things I avoid:

  1. Drying plastic containers by hand (they can drip dry)
  2. Bees (allergic)
  3. Shaving my legs (hellooo Autumn!)
  4. The two mailing boxes in my office

Oh, the boxes look innocent enough, all fluffy-cornered from the multiple moves I’ve dragged them through over the past six years, held together with packing tape and stubbornness. Those two boxes, though, (each no longer and higher than hand to elbow) are crammed to bursting with monsters. Monsters lurking in between the photos of my oldest son learning to ride a bike, monsters nibbling on the edges of the pictures of my youngest dancing in the backyard, monsters stuffed into every frame, every spare gasp of air, wrapped around every memory sleeping in the boxes. Memories have vicious teeth, and if I open those boxes I’m going to get mauled.

I know so many of the photos in there, favourites but unseen for ages. My grandfather and his honking big nose (he’s been buried and gone for nearly six years now), entire handfuls of baby pictures taken as my newborns slept, the stop motion record of my boys growing, grousing, grinning. I remember taking so many of the pictures, seeing all I held dearest through the tiny view hole, totally in love with my love and my family. Those boxes are time capsules, and they hold a time – a family – long busted and left behind. I don’t want to remember how terribly, awfully, gloriously in love I was with my husband – and I’m afraid that that’s going to be the scariest, cruelest monster of them all, patiently waiting to chew my calm into pieces.

But moths have been eating my memories. Recently I’ve held my breath and desperately grabbed at a stack of photos from the boxes, pulling out my own guts and being pained and delighted at the treasure. I’d forgotten the ginger tinge to my firstborn’s hair and eyebrows, the porcelain perfection of my second son’s face in his first week in my arms. I’d lost sight of how much difference four years makes in any manchild’s face, posture, loves and mannerisms. I’d forgotten how violently red my hair was as a heavily-freckled six year old. I’d forgotten how much I have loved so many people for so long.

I think the monsters’ days are numbered. Change is coming, albeit incredibly slowly. Following our latest move, the boxes didn’t find themselves yet again in the darkest corner of my wardrobe; instead, they are in the office and I see them several times a day. I’ve bought photo albums. Admittedly, I bought them over a year ago, but it counts as change, people! I’ve repeatedly cracked the tape open, fossicked through a couple of stacks to find a suitably surreal pic to share as part of #tbt*. All enormous, boot-kicking stomps forward and any stinging bite from a monster was more than offset by the joy and satisfaction of seeing loved faces yet again.

Photographs are important. I’ve hated having my photo taken for decades, but now I want to be seen, to be remembered as being somewhere, doing something (laughing, eating, swimming, being a clown) with people I adore. I have one picture of myself with my biological Dad taken when I was a baby. Due to family implosion, it took me twenty-six years to see that photo and my Dad again, but I treasure the photo. It shows a strong family resemblance, the obvious love he had for me, that there was at least one moment where my parents were happy together. Photos are part of who we are, where and who we’re from, what we’ve lived, loved, tried, completed and what we’re becoming. Photos help us remember the details that get sifted and lost amid the everyday ordinariness, and if there’s pain in gazing upon the face of an achingly missed loved one, there can be a little relief that they aren’t lost entirely to our sight as well as to our arms.

I have monsters in my office, crammed into two wonky cardboard boxes. One day, maybe soon, I’ll go monster hunting… Or maybe I’ll just snuggle with my monsters, and remember the beauty and innocence of once upon a time.

What things to you avoid that have monsters and sharp teeth attached? How have you approached something difficult, knowing it will bring back difficult – and good – memories? What’s your favourite thing to avoid?

#tbt is throw-back Thursday, where, on social media like Instagram and Facebook, people show photos of themselves from times long past, tagging the shot #tbt. It’s hilarious, embarrassing, awwww-invoking and inspiring.


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