More Photos, But the Memories Are Different

Photos ain't what they used to be. This picture of my daughter Bridget is one of many favorites of the fall. I have more favorite photos than I used to because I take more photos. The days of choosing your shots selectively because of the expense of developing the film are over. Digital cameras let you take several shots of even the most ordinary subject and then delete them later. Or, maybe you don't delete anything and just fill one memory card after another. We pose for more pictures than ever for the same reason. Every lunch or load of laundry can now be memorialized on somebody's cell phone. You might think that this revolution in photography would lead to hours of added enjoyment looking at all the scrapbooks filled with wonderful memories. In my life, the opposite is true. When I used film, I always got the pictures developed and usually put the best ones in an album. Since going digital, I don't remember the last time I had photos developed. I save them in a massive file on my computer and they'll spend eternity in some "storage cloud". Nothing is stopping me from developing them and putting them in a scrapbook, I just don't do it with digital photos and I suspect many people are like me. I guess I'll sit down at the computer and look back at them every so often over the years, but it won't be like looking at the keepsake photo albums I used to put together myself. It's a pity in a way, because this shot of 5 year-old Bridget on a horse would have looked great in a photo album.