A Christmas Memory

I ran across this photo of my 3-year-old self on Santa's lap this evening while perusing old photo albums for holiday pics. The album that contained this picture was part of a photo collection, with witty captions, that my mother had created for me several years prior to her death in 2001. This compilation quickly became one of my favorite gifts of all time from her - I feel her presence every single time I leaf through it.



I'd always enjoyed the photos and humorous captions that Mom had added to them, but had never pulled these photo "treasures" from their berth in this valued gift to further explore what else might lie there. Tonight, however, I did. This is the back side of my "picture with Santa":



Turns out that this photo was taken with a Polaroid Land Camera at our own G.C.Murphy here in downtown Fort Wayne! I'm 40 years older now, and Mom has been gone for 6 1/2 years, but I still own a Polaroid Land Camera and the former G.C.Murphy building is still in use as well. Sometimes what is lost can be found again; think of the W&D Santa display or the old Murphy's donut machine. I guess we sometimes have to open up familiar things to get at the hidden treasures inside. . .

MERRY CHRISTMAS!