Keeper of the Legacy

Okay, so here's the thing.... I LOVE SCRAPBOOKING.... I love the whole "keeper of the legacy" concept.... it's a part of me..... has been for as many years as I can remember. It provides roots.... a sense of belonging..... a creative outlet.... art therapy, etc.


 I'm a photographer. I have a good eye for composition....not so much the technical side of the art... but I know how to emit emotion.... tell a story in a single photograph.... evoke connectivity. More like a photojournalist, if you will. When I was in high school, that's what I wanted to go to college for.... photojournalism. The adventurous side of me wanted to parachute into war-torn countries, sneak in relief for the locals and then tell their story in photos..... Of course, that was BK .... before kids.... when I could afford to be a little reckless.


 I'm a writer. I am comfortable with words. I have a whole arsenal full ..... and I know how to use them. :-) Journaling has been a passion of mine since I was in junior high school. For my senior write up in the yearbook, I put, for my future: "To write and smile til my heart's content. To always dream, believe & be ambitious but never lose respect". I learned the power and beauty of words, not to mention having a great outlet for expression. I write love letters to my children, too...many of them have found their way into their scrapbooks.


So here's my dilemma....although digi scrapping used to be a huge part of my life....my passion....my mission... I find that now I have this emotional block that brings with it, frustration.



A couple of years ago, my husband left us. So many memories have gone by, unrecorded. See, he's the one who actually taught me to do digital design (born out of a need to trim my spending on traditional scrapping supplies. lol).... He's the one who got Photoshop and showed me how to really get the most out of it. He bought me an awesome professional camera, a macbook pro laptop, a wide format printer, a great scanner, etc. ... all to enhance my passion for preserving our family memories and to use for his own designs. All of those things are so attached to him.... not to mention the pages... we were an army family and when I look at my gallery.... it's like watching our whole relationship in a slide show. He even designed a kit for me as a Valentine's gift one year. It was one thing he praised me for and encouraged me in, constantly. So when I think of scrapbooking.... I think of it as ... our whole family.... OUR legacy. Now the memories are painful and I hate that.


 I really want to clear this emotional hurdle. Friends and family are great cheerleaders, praising my art. Many of my layouts are posted in my Facebook albums. Others have asked me to teach them how to do it and...... I just can't. Recently I have figured out why I avoid anything scrap related. I would chalk it up to being a busy, suddenly-single mom of 4.... trying to balance home life with a full time job.... and make ends meet on a very limited budget. Most of the gear he bought for me has fallen by the wayside.... how apropos & symbolic.  He took some things with him. Thieves stole others when my house was broken into or there are parts that need to be replaced.


But I was forced to face the truth of my apathy towards my former passion:  It reminds me of a happy time that went terribly wrong. And I just don't have time to deal with the residual emotions of that breakup. Life needs to be lived. Children need to be cared for.  Bills need to be paid.


I can feel my life transitioning  in quite a few areas ... a fresh start, if you will... and I want to reclaim my passion. But I need to be able to differentiate what parts are ME and what parts are HIM.... and shed the "him" part. :-)  Our times together were not all pleasant, obviously.  I tried my best to be the photojournalist that I always wanted to be and record the good with the bad, the tragedies and the triumphs.... the strengths and the weaknesses.  I don't want to paint a false "reality" of our home life. The children know better. :-)  And so do the friends and family that helped us in weathering the storms.


My children need for me to be the keeper of the legacy.  If not me, then who?  How will they know?  How will they remember and understand?  Life hits hard and fast and with that comes forgetfulness.  Not purposefully, necessarily.... but other, more pressing things, can crowd out..... the carefree night we stopped the car in the bank parking lot and ran through the sprinklers, laughing and dancing..... or the time the 'baby' glued his hand to his brother's bed after his brother left for college.... or the drawings gracing my bed after I had surgery.... Who will record those reminders of our ordinary everyday wonderful adventures?  Who will preserve the memories of how we, as a WHOLE family, overcame?  We are complete.  We are not broken.


So, by the grace of God, I will take my scrap sisters' advice and JUST DO IT.  I must. My love for life compels me.  I am a scrapbooker.  I am a photographer.  I am a writer.  I am the keeper of the legacy.



"The Lord says, 'Forget what happened before

and do not think about the past.

Look at the new thing I am going to do.

It is already happening.

Don't you see it?

I will make a road in the desert

And rivers in the dry land.' "

{Isaiah 43:18-19}