It’s an interesting thought though–one that hadn’t really occurred to me before–there are things better left to the imagination. It’s not that my media-savvyness has failed me; I’m certainly steeped in it. But I hadn’t realized that even I was guilty of trying to trap time in a picture to make sense of things that are by their nature unexplainable.

McGoo already does it when he wants to remember things. I realized his toothbrush was getting scungy and that we should give it the toss. Rather than just chuck it (I know better now) I told him we were going to throw it away soon and get a new one. His way of memorializing his toothbrush? “Will you take a picture of it? No, take two!”

I think he recognizes the fleeting and is trying to trap it in amber. Which is definitely what I think happened when we took pictures of Kitty. Helpless to our own grief, we wanted to fill the void of her before she was gone. But no void can be filled with those pictures. That wasn’t our cat; that was a broken vessel slowly draining away before our eyes.

I say this as a reminder to myself for how I deal with life in the future. No death-bed images! No hastily shot pictures when we’re feeling uncomfortable in our sadness! No hiding behind the lens when we’re wondering what to do with our hands and our hearts!

I know who you were giving me a picture of; I have a nice one of you and him dressed like dapper dons. That one is perfect.