Ancient History

So for Christmas I received two very lovely iTunes cards each containing the amount of 15 dollars, and today I decided to add them together and start purchasing more music to add to my ever expanding iTunes library.

I am now the proud listener of Rescue Me by Fontella Bass and This Will Be (An Everlasting Love) by Natalie Cole, among others. But mainly these two because for whatever self imposed reason, I find myself slightly obsessed with music that is before my time.

On our vacation my ears were filled with the likes of Leon Patillo, Larry Norman and other names that are currently escaping my memory. I like the music of the 60s and 70s. It has some sort of appeal to me.

So I've been keeping the stereo volume on high and belting my lungs out to songs that were created before I was even a blip on the radar of life. I think I'm beginning to lose my voice because of this new found addiction, but I'm not about to start complaining.

The music of the past just seems to carry a certain history with it. It's dated. It happened a long time ago (or a short time ago, it all depends really on your point of view). But no matter how long ago the music was created, it revolves around the culture that created it during that period in time.

Much like people.

And people have relatives. And those relatives are now alive. And those relatives have pictures.

Old pictures.

I love old pictures. Just as much as I love old songs.

Because they have history.

I never like history class that much in school. Mostly that was because I didn't enjoy the requirement of learning dates to events that no one cared about and then regurgitating that information on a test that determined whether or not I passed that class. Yeah, that didn't so much intrigue me.

What I loved to learn about what the culture. The people. The events. What may or may not have taken place on November 17, 1846 is of no concern to me. The exact time of day that President Lincoln gave a speech on the subject of slavery does not matter. The fact that he did it, people listened, and history was made is what matters to me.

And also the fact that I am related to people who lived during that era.

Today I was at Grandma's house. Mom and I went over to take down their artificial-i-don't-smell-like-a-real-tree-but-i'm-still-pretty plastic tree. It was fun, and we were treated to a meal at Red Robin for doing such great work. Upon return to my grandparents' dwelling we viewed a picture album my grandma had received from her sister.

All old photos.

Pure gold.

There was a date that was far back as 1917. Wow. I was intrigued. All those people in those pictures! They all had lives and families. Jobs. Cares. Worries. Interests. And they were in pictures that I could see proof of life back then. You know, since I believe there wasn't really a world until I was born and then everyone just sort of showed up and pretended like their shenanigans had been going on for quite some time. They're all just really good actors, you know.

But seriously.

It really started yesterday when I was going through my parents' wedding pictures, followed by pictures from when I was really little and TheKeeper was really little...and well, basically just everyone was really little.

It's just really crazy how much things have changed.

Change.

I think that's my word for the year 2010. Life is full of change. My life is a constant flow of motion. What's here today may not be there tomorrow. And what was here two days ago is maybe gone.

What word best describes how you believe 2010 will be?