Between the Bookends

My scanner is my archivist, with days, weeks, and months of taking each photo out of its sleeve and bequeathing to them 0s and 1s before they disintegrate. Albums off a shelf that contain a lifetime between two bookends.

"Mom Before Dad," photos of a baby, little girl, posing or not, happy or not, alive--life documented. Even though they're her memories, I'm with her from girlhood to pubescence to adolescent coquette. Didn't she feel my presence? I'm not just observing, I'm visiting.

"Wedding." The day I realized I was truly happy. I liked the way that felt. Human. Earlier that day, the family posed, as stiff as the old emulsion portraits from another album. Just in color, this time. Fade the color and they're like previous monochromic generations.

"Honeymoon." Acapulco poolside--casual innocence of dedicated monogamy. Quotidian sex. The gift of expressing love physically. Every honeymoon shot hints that we had been without clothing moments earlier. That smirk on my face. That smile on hers. So beautiful, nubile, and willing. Sex is a beautiful surrender. 

Unconditional love for her as she sleeps one wall away, face softened, brow unfurrowed, lips slightly north of a neutral smile. The dark airbrushes her features. There is my young beauty again. I have walked with you today through your childhood, honeymoon, births and birthdays, and real life going on in the expressions on our children's faces. So beautiful.

Loving her is seeing her as I always have: holding my hand, dancing with me, marrying me, postcoitally clothed for the honeymoon camera, bellies with the unborn, mother of the born, co-parenting in the joys of raising children right. The bookends on the shelf fall.

But I don't need the dark. She glows in the dark for me. Framed forever for viewing later. Suddenly, mortality sounds lovely.