Don’t Crop The Background On Your Pictures

One day you will be glad that you didn’t

My sister dropped off a box of pictures a couple of months ago. I didn’t realize that it would be one of the last times I would ever see her. She had been struggling physically before she died in a car crash last month.

The day came when I forced myself to go through the pictures. Most were of her children when they were young. However, I found a few other treasures in the box.

There was a picture of her and me when I was a baby. Not only are there very few pictures of the two of us, but there are next to no baby pictures of me. Taking pictures back in “the day” was a hassle, and it was expensive. I was the fourth baby, and hence, no baby book, no pictures, just another baby to figure out where to put in an already crowded house.

I enjoyed seeing myself as a baby, and I also enjoyed looking at the background in the picture. I wasn’t surprised to see a huge bookshelf full of books. My mother was a book lover, and she passed that love down to me. Thank goodness for the Kindle app on my iPad, or I would have to buy a separate house for my books.

The next treasure I found was of my father and my oldest nephew. That baby was the apple of my daddy’s eye. In the photo, my father is holding the baby, but these days my eye wants to focus on the background.

I remember that lamp well. The chair and table not so much. The clutter of the table was typical of us as a family. I can’t remember exactly where in the room that my father is sitting.

You see, he had a habit of moving things. Like rooms! Yes, entire rooms. One day he would visit the builder supply, and the next day he would start tearing out walls or building some more. So in my lifetime, our house went from five rooms to ten.

He moved the kitchen three times. I went to college and came home and had to keep reminding myself to turn a different way to get some water. He also moved a bathroom at least twice.

A cousin once told me that he enjoyed coming to our house to see what my father had done to the house.

Growing up, I never realized that other people didn’t do this type of thing. When I bought my own house, my father knocked out some windows for me and put in French doors in their place.

Having a father with skills certainly came in handy.

Finding these pictures and more like them fills me with joy. It brings back memories of times gone by and of people who I love and won’t see again in this life.

Take it from me. Don’t crop your pictures. The background in them is very special.