11
in

Love ItLove It

Wander project what my father thought was Misc!

It is not a daunting task to wander old pictures. Today, some pictures my father put in a folder he called MISC. I do not know why he had the folder on his computer. I know at various times, I told him he needed to move the pictures off the memory card, and onto the hard drive of the computer. Then, from time to time, burn a CD with the pictures on it. That would give him three copies (he never erased the memory cards when they got full he bought a new one)! My memories of the last couple of years mom and dad had the farm different. I was often out to the farm for Sunday dinner, until we moved to Cincinnati, Ohio. It was a 2.5-hour drive (3 hours when we lived in Maineville).

We didn’t come to the farm as often after June 1991 (we got married on the deck of the farm). We had moved to Cincinnati on June 1, I had resigned as a teacher, and we were now an Ohio family! After the wedding, we still came back to Indiana often, but always then for big holidays. Mom and dad moved back into town (Bloomington) while we were in Ohio.  It is funny how, as an adult, your life pulls into work. Moving to Ohio was a huge transition for us. I think it was harder on my wife’s parents and my parents. As we moved to Ohio, I still had three living grandparents. My father’s father had passed away many years before. Both my parents were still working.

But us moving to Ohio was tough on everyone. In part because we were the outlier on one side. My wife’s brother lived in Birmingham, Alabama, so my in-laws were used to traveling. Ohio was East a bit of Alabama, but they never complained. My brother-in-law and his family moved to Tallahassee Florida later, and so did my wife’s parents. One of my last real memories of the farm was the first Christmas after our daughter was born. She arrived to quote Harry Chapin in the usual way. November 1992, by Christmas she was already sleeping through the night. We had moved to Maineville, and we wandered to the farm for Christmas Day. I think we were there a little more like five days. My grandmother (mother’s mother) had died earlier that year (1992). Christmas was a little subdued but still a celebration I will never forget.

  1. Looks wonderful, Scott. They are legacy images to be cherished. Just think of your grandchildren showing their grandchildren what ‘the old place’ looked like ‘back then’. At least nowadays we can a trace of our being.

    1
  2. I agree. It is such a shame more people did not chronicle their times. I author books regarding the Royal Navy, but not in a (very) academic way. My books reflect the ‘common man’, who would otherwise be forgotten. The books record ‘Social History’, not the military or political one.
    Recently, with the remembrance of the wars, d-day and such, the media has proved the stories of the ‘ordinary’ man are for more than valuable for historians and social learning than ever imagined previously, they far from ordinary. I think your Wander project has much of the same value; unknown until recognised as a far more accurate account of life than any academic paper could hope to portray.

    1

Report

What do you think?

Written by DocAndersen

One fan, One team and a long time dream Go Cubs!!!!!!!!!!!!!

15 Comments

Leave a Reply
  1. Beautiful pictures …. you’ve really moved a lot … and this is a long distance from you … I can move from one end of Slovenia to another end and I have a maximum of 2 hours drive (200km) … with you however, the distances are incredible even if you move from one country to another

    1

Leave a Reply