Ageless Love
September 17, 2010
My dad’s side of the family saves everything. My grandma still has my dad’s camp shirts from when he was elementary school age – he’s going to be 65 next month. My grandma’s house is a museum, not esthetically speaking, but historically; she has furniture, plates, jewelry and pictures handed down hundreds of years. Every once and a while we go through her numerous trunks and my kids have a great time trying on vintage clothes and laughing at their great uncles in old-fashioned clothes and curls – can’t really blame them, terrible fashion statement.
This weekend I was at my parents’ house and they decided to get out a couple of trunks and go through them with the kids. It’s amazing the history lesson available to you once you open the trunks. There were pictures of my great-great uncle and all his papers and belongings from his years serving aboard ship in the Navy. There were pictures, books, a vanity set complete with antique brush, comb, mirror – everything. We like to tease my mom that since she comes from a Sicilian mafia background, all her family heirlooms were confiscated as evidence!
As I was looking through artifacts from my heritage, I found this picture:
It’s damaged and stained, but what it shows is beautiful. It was given to my parents as a valentine by my uncle, who I believe took the picture. They are not members of my family, but you have to appreciate a love that lasts this long, and not only lasts, but is memorialized by a picture, taken by the man who loved her.
