The past jumped out and shook my hand recently. I was beside myself with gladness to make the introduction. My mother and her cousins have been sharing old photographs between them, of my great grandparents' generation, and a couple pictures of my great-great grandfather, who I knew nothing about until this week. The photos are gorgeous, with the crisp colors that make slides so intoxicating to view. The ones I've seen so far date from somewhere in the 1960s to as far back as the mid-1940s. The details are incredible. I can practically feel the seams on their clothes, feel the sun warming their faces, hear the Oklahoma wind blowing through the hollyhocks rising behind my great grandparents. I have spent hours studying their features, and I think I can see a glimmer of myself in my great grandmother--the shape of her head, her tendency toward plumpness (or maybe that is just all Okies, I don't know). I have similarly focused on pictures of my other maternal great grandmother, the one I knew as a child, and I had seen much of myself in her little German face. I wish I could have spent time with all these people I've just met through film. I wonder what they would think of me. A great uncle was described as having "held the majority stock in the (family) sense of humor." How could I not want to know exactly what that was like? And my great-great grandfather apparently was a stone mason his whole life, so serious about it that he continued to hand-make concrete blocks well into his golden years. What a tough guy.
I know I've had a long-running ban of posting photos of real faces in this space, but these people are long dead. They're not going to mind if I share. Besides, I'm starting to think I can relax those rules a little. I'm easing into making a change. That's not to say I'll stop with the flower pictures, especially with my family sending me such lovely ones (Pope John roses from Oklahoma and lilacs from Colorado, plus the evidence that someone with very interesting feet has been wandering near the condo).
Today was the deadline for offers on the condo, and there were two. I will not share details yet, because nothing is finalized. We are in discussions, waiting for formal paperwork to sign. But the joyous takeaway is that yes, we appear to have succeeded in the first go-round with the crazy Colorado real estate market. The first hurdle is in the process of being cleared. There are still many challenges ahead. Plenty of time for our hearts to be broken as we bid and fail to get a few houses. I'll have much to write about in the coming weeks.
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