Photographs & Memories (wouldn’t that make a great song title?!)

True confession.  I spend quite a bit of time on Facebook social media.  I admit it.  Not a horrible amount of time where I have carpel tunnel, sore thumbs and a trigger finger but if you’re one of my Facebook friends you know I share my life with posts and pictures a bunch. I feel it’s a bit like journaling. Or at least that’s my rationale. It could possibly be my addictive personality but that’s a blog topic for yet another day…

My favorite part of Facebook is Facebook Memories.  It’s fun to have photo memories pop up each day chronicling events that happened in past years on that same date.  I especially love seeing Bob in his healthier days and I am glad that I have the pictures of Bob even in his years of cognitive decline and poor health.  I pour over all the pictures and soak in the memories—thinking of the good times and feeling the love! The pictures and attached memories are so needed—a blessed reminder of the wonderful life I had with my hubby. I truly cherish all the memories.  Even in the throes of caregiving, I was grateful for Bob.  Tired, struggling, frazzled, sad, but happy to be Bob’s wife.

Now there’s a new thing going on.  Bob’s been deceased for long enough that now I have new Facebook Memories that don’t include him. When these Bob-absent photo memories pop up on Facebook, I’m a bit saddened. I didn’t want a life without Bob, and I wanted more time and more memories. But the overall takeaway is that these new Bob-absent photo memories are a reminder that I am continuing to live. Living a new season of life without Bob being physically here. Bob’s memory is now my “partner”! (Thanks to author Mitch Albom for that expression)

There were times that I wondered if I would mentally, physically and spiritually survive Bob’s illness and passing. I was a wreck in all those aspects.  When you’re in the thick of it, it is excruciatingly hard and the thought of living a somewhat normal life seems quite impossible.  But here I am 2 years and 7+ months later, and I am not only living a “normal” life but leading a happy, thriving, productive, and enjoyable life. 

And I have Facebook Memories to prove it!!