Sometimes a photo from the past calls out, demanding a story. In this case, no one is left to tell it. My mom (right) died in February 2006, tragically of a brain tumor at 67 years old, and her older sister (left) followed in 2010, her heart failing her (plus, dementia). Here they are, the sisters, Roberta and Judith, a moment of youth captured. I have so many questions. Did they really both get root canals at the same time? Did they have a spat that included punches or slaps? (I doubt it.) Is one making fun of the other’s dental-related misery? If so, I’d guess my mom is the jokester, the actress, knowing their personalities. But oh, those faces, both so serious. So moody in black and white. Maybe the root canal story is the right one.
Which of my grandparents took the photo? I’m assuming it was one of them. Were they smiling at the potential silliness of it, or feeling someone’s actual pain? Was it the girls’ idea to pose in this way?
The perfectly curled hair—I can picture those little pink bristled rollers getting too hot in that steamy plastic dome that sat on every girl’s bathroom counter in the ‘50s. And the neat brows, smoothed just so with a tiny brush. My mom’s shirt buttoned all the way up against her long, white neck. Earlobes soft and clean, no jewels. One ring apiece. And those pleated fabric ice packs with the screw-off top, cubes inside crunching against one another as the user shifted it around in search of a colder arrangement.
I’m a thrift store junkie and often there’s a box at the register filled with old family photos, dumped by the generation who can’t name the subjects anymore. Usually they are the really formal portraits, everyone coiffed and serious as they held steady for the countdown, and you can’t help but feel a little sad at where they ended up. I wonder about those images, with so many tales behind them. I’ve heard of people hanging them in their homes as “adopted families,” naming each person, renewing them with made-up histories. This is Uncle Fred, in sales, a bit of a drinker but good-hearted, and Aunt Martha, who loved to tell an obvious fib or two at the holiday table to make the kids laugh. That’s kind of sweet.
I’ve never been tempted to take those images home. But I think if I saw this one in one of those boxes, I’d snap it up. The dramatic sisters, in the bathroom, posing, their lives ahead of them, a story between them.
Definitely both had wisdom teeth pulled: 1. they look to be about the right age for that, and 2. look where they’re holding the ice packs–right where they’d be sore if wisdom teeth had been pulled.
Re: you mother’s buttoned up shirt: doesn’t that look more like a pajama top than a shirt?
Excellent thinking!
I’m going to put my ’50’s childhood behind RuthB: the large dots and the piping might well argue for a pajama top. And they are so beautiful, aren’t they. They could break your heart they’re so beautiful.