Photos from the past
I got a wild hair and pulled out most of the photos I had sitting in one of the stackable cubes I use as a end table in the apartment and started going through them.
What a change in 18 years my life's taken. The very first photo I find is from my high school prom in 1990. My big glasses, goofy haircut...damned if I didn't look too bad in a tux, though. And of course, Gena Schallen's standing next to me. A decent prom date, to be sure, but man did I probably frustrate the hell out of her. I never made a move on her. Heck, she had to finally corner me at the prom afterparty to get a kiss out of me and even then, that was just one quick peck. (At the 10 year HS reunion, when she found out I was gay, she was like, "well, that explains a lot.")
Other photos; no particular order -- Oliver Hall's 25th anniversary, my hair's shoulder-length; senior year at KU, it's to my shoulderblades; post-grad school it's even longer. Only through years of hindsight do I realize that I should have cut it shorter, it would have made it -- and me -- look a little less unkempt.
Photos of Scott; photos from the World Weavers/USS Oberon "con" within some scifi convention in Mars, PA; photos from the trip to the ISCAnic in Iowa City, Iowa; photos from my graduation from the School of Education...and photos of namastegiggles. :)
I don't know if my beloved best friend will read this any time soon -- and knowing me I'll want to just email her anyway and tell her -- but she was then, as she totally is now, probably the most naturally beautiful woman I have ever met. When she smiles, it lights up a room -- and even in a photograph, she never fails to make ME smile, because I am so lucky to have such an amazing person in my life. (And I have a LOT of photos of her -- I'll have to find a way to scan some in and show her...I bet she yells at me about keeping some of them...hehe ;) )
There are some other photos...photos of people I'd rather forget. Photos of people who scarred my life, two men, actually. One of them I actually invited to my graduation! And the other was a manipulative bastard who was responsible for me growing up -- and growing cynical -- in my gay life. Too many pics of him, actually. Maybe I should just burn those...collect them all, pile them in the barbecue grill by my apartment, make some sort of self-affirming statement about how I'm freed from his influence, and burn the whole f'ing pile.
Think it'd be wrong to send him the ashes?
Yeah, me too...but damn, it would be fun to see his face.
One day I'll sit down and organize all the photos (even the bag I didn't get to...yes, I had many more), from oldest to newest. Put them into an album, or a scrapbook. Maybe I can recruit Mom to help me get organized (she -has- asked me if I'd be interested in doing something like that).
Or maybe I won't. Maybe the photos are meant to be jumbled as they are, high school intermixed with college, mixed with post-KU, mixed with 25+ year old faded snapshots of when I lived in Denver as a child...mixed with photos of the young man I was, when I thought the future held so much more than it seems to hold as I sit here, writing in this blog.
What a change in 18 years my life's taken. The very first photo I find is from my high school prom in 1990. My big glasses, goofy haircut...damned if I didn't look too bad in a tux, though. And of course, Gena Schallen's standing next to me. A decent prom date, to be sure, but man did I probably frustrate the hell out of her. I never made a move on her. Heck, she had to finally corner me at the prom afterparty to get a kiss out of me and even then, that was just one quick peck. (At the 10 year HS reunion, when she found out I was gay, she was like, "well, that explains a lot.")
Other photos; no particular order -- Oliver Hall's 25th anniversary, my hair's shoulder-length; senior year at KU, it's to my shoulderblades; post-grad school it's even longer. Only through years of hindsight do I realize that I should have cut it shorter, it would have made it -- and me -- look a little less unkempt.
Photos of Scott; photos from the World Weavers/USS Oberon "con" within some scifi convention in Mars, PA; photos from the trip to the ISCAnic in Iowa City, Iowa; photos from my graduation from the School of Education...and photos of namastegiggles. :)
I don't know if my beloved best friend will read this any time soon -- and knowing me I'll want to just email her anyway and tell her -- but she was then, as she totally is now, probably the most naturally beautiful woman I have ever met. When she smiles, it lights up a room -- and even in a photograph, she never fails to make ME smile, because I am so lucky to have such an amazing person in my life. (And I have a LOT of photos of her -- I'll have to find a way to scan some in and show her...I bet she yells at me about keeping some of them...hehe ;) )
There are some other photos...photos of people I'd rather forget. Photos of people who scarred my life, two men, actually. One of them I actually invited to my graduation! And the other was a manipulative bastard who was responsible for me growing up -- and growing cynical -- in my gay life. Too many pics of him, actually. Maybe I should just burn those...collect them all, pile them in the barbecue grill by my apartment, make some sort of self-affirming statement about how I'm freed from his influence, and burn the whole f'ing pile.
Think it'd be wrong to send him the ashes?
Yeah, me too...but damn, it would be fun to see his face.
One day I'll sit down and organize all the photos (even the bag I didn't get to...yes, I had many more), from oldest to newest. Put them into an album, or a scrapbook. Maybe I can recruit Mom to help me get organized (she -has- asked me if I'd be interested in doing something like that).
Or maybe I won't. Maybe the photos are meant to be jumbled as they are, high school intermixed with college, mixed with post-KU, mixed with 25+ year old faded snapshots of when I lived in Denver as a child...mixed with photos of the young man I was, when I thought the future held so much more than it seems to hold as I sit here, writing in this blog.