Living in the Present

I had a friend come over last night, and it turned out to be quite an adventure. She's never been to my new apartment and has difficulty with directions so she followed me home from work [Adventure #1]. We were pretty hungry for dinner at that point, so i started cooking up a quick box meal, put it in an 8x8 glass pan, and cooked in the oven at 400 degrees for the specified time. We sat outside on a couch perched on the deck, chatting about life and her recent dating irritations. Upon the timer ringing, we went back in and found a disaster in the oven. Apparently my glass container shattered [Adventure #2].

I turned off the oven, and we went out to eat. WoOt! We walked there, which was a bit adventure, because of the way the buildings are set up, and we walked into a 10 foot drop... luckily not before we saw it. We ate at Noodles & Co. which is one of my favorite places. My friend had never been there [Adventure #3]. She chatted on about boys again and at some point i interrupted and said, "So what do you think about the food?" She seemed to snap out of her trance and say, "Oh, um, it's really good! I think it's my new favorite restaurant too!"

On the way home, we stopped at Paradise Cafe (another one of my favorites, and a new place for her) and got a free chocolate chip cookie with a coupon i had, and we split it. She was very impressed. "I should take my mom out to eat here." [Adventure #4]

By the time we walked back to my apartment (5 min), she had created and solidified plans with other friends... boys included... and needed to leave to make it there on time. She invited Dave and I, but we're too broke for a theater movie right now, and i told her that upfront.

Looking back on the evening, I see many adventures worth noting that evening, but what stuck out to me the most this time, is her apparent utter lack in acknowledging the amount of wild fun we had. I can imagine her going to the movies with her other friends and saying to them, "Oh, i just went and saw Keshia. I was at Keshia's and Dave's Apartment." with no further detail. Because in her mind, nothing exciting happened.

The saddest part about this is that there are hundreds of people who live their lives this way. So focused on what they don't have that they miss everything they do have; always looking for a better time when a great one is right in front of them.

Photo Album organizing

Today's blessing and curse is that we can take too many pictures too easily. A blessing because then we're sure to get a good picture. A curse because there's a high potential that i'll find a reason to need to keep all of them, therefore leading to photo chaos... piles of priceless photos stacked everywhere... despite the lack of quality in a great majority of them.

Up until this week, it was my intention to scrapbook all of them in 8x10 binders or a 12x12 scrapbook. However, since i have about a small shoebox's worth (600 photos) of printed photos to scrapbook and about two or three more shoeboxes worth unprinted... I'm considering photo albums. On top of that, some of the pages i did only 4 years ago, are already becoming un-glued. They're not going to last.

The problem with the photo album is i can't put anything except photos in them... and i have a crate full of programs from talent shows and performances i participated in, letters, cards, love notes, and movie tickets. Plus there's the occasional picture printed in a larger size than 4x6. What do i do with those? My second problem is that i've randomly scrap-booked all parts of my life; so to keep these photo albums and scrapbooks in order, i would have to take apart some of my hard-labor scrapbook pages. . . or fill in all the missing pages (ie hundreds of photos) andthen start doing photo albums.

My Best solution so far, is to

1- scrapbook the missing pages here or there

2- scan the several pages that i may end up taking apart

3- print and organize all photos

4- put excess or bad pictures in a 'giveaway' box

5- insert any knick-knacks that can fit into a photo album

6- select sections of photos to scrapbook in an album, accounting for the size of the album

7- create binders of all other material that cannot be added into a photo album and scrapbook them in a "no-photo scrapbook" as outlined on google sites.

I'm still frustrated though. partly because i can't pay for prints right now... and partly because i'm not sure how well this system will actually work. The system i really want... scrapbooking everything on 8x10 or 12x12 ... is unrealistic, unfortunately... since most pictures register as 'important.'

How does one know when a picture is a keeper or a 'giveaway?' Google has a list...

1- a decent and rare picture of a family member or loved one

2- it touches an emotion of a viewer and impacts their life [for good]

3- a picture of a life-changing event in one's life

4- it shows beauty and/or truth. Shows my point of view

5- it's proof of an event

6- no particular picture is the best, but the collection together in a series

i could fit most of my thousands of pictures under these 6 reasons... but perhaps knowing the reasons can help me determine better what's worth keeping to me. The last thing i consider when trying to decide whether to scrapbook or trash a picture is asking myself these three questions:

1- Does the picture make you feel happy? or otherwise? Is this something you want to remember forever?

2- Is this something you want to share with your children or friends? Will they see it if it is scrap-booked?

3- Is this picture worth the cost of (A) saving on the computer's memory, (B) printing, (C) putting into one of 200 slots in a $15 photo album, or (D) the cost of the scrapbook paper, stickers and glue on the page?

Lastly... i have a lot of random pictures in the middle... should i make an exception to chronological order for topical order... family photos verses college life... and how do i do that?

Any additional insights?