I Built Our Family Photo Archive For Thirty Years — Then My Sister’s Slideshow Showed Me What Was Missing
PART 2
I called Rachel from Linda’s driveway.
My daughter answered on the fourth ring. “If this is about Grandma’s birthday, Aunt Linda already sent me three spreadsheets.”
“It is not about a spreadsheet.”
“Then I’m listening.”
“How many pictures do you have of me?”
There was a pause.
“That is an unsettling question.”
“I’m serious.”
“Mom, you have an entire camera roll full of selfies you hate.”
“Family pictures. Holidays. Trips. Things like that.”
Another pause, longer this time.
“I don’t know.”
“Linda made the birthday slideshow. One hundred eighty-two pictures. I’m in seven.”
Rachel was quiet.
Then she said, “That sounds about right.”
The answer hit harder than surprise would have.
“About right?”
“You’re always taking them.”
“So nobody ever thought maybe I should be in them?”
“People thought that all the time.”
I gripped the steering wheel even though the car was parked.
“Who?”
“Me, for one.”
“When?”
“Every Christmas until I was about twenty.”
“That is dramatic.”
“It is accurate.”
She laughed once, but not because anything was funny.
“Mom, do you remember my college graduation dinner? I tried to take a picture of you and Grandma, and you made me delete it because you said the restaurant lighting made everybody look green.”
“It did.”
“You made us move outside.”
“The light was better.”
“Then you took the camera back.”
I started to argue and stopped.
Rachel kept going.
“At Thanksgiving two years ago, I asked David to get a picture of you at the table. You said your hair looked strange and stood up to photograph everybody else.”
“My hair did look strange.”
“See?”
I closed my eyes.
“People stopped insisting,” Rachel said. “Not because we didn’t want you in pictures. Because you always acted like being behind the camera was where you wanted to be.”
A pickup truck pulled out of Linda’s neighbor’s driveway. I watched it pass.
“Did I?”
“Yes.”
Her voice softened.
“You still do.”
