Mystery woman

I have spent the last few evenings viewing old movies as my son is making them into a video. It is a fascinating experience and a fun thing to see each child enter the family home from the same hospital and then go on to the first birthday, first day at kindergarten and so on.

The first three all used the same mat when they went off to school and opened the same door when they arrived. First Jon alone and then later with little Julie in tow playing on the climbing bars. Then Julie’s turn and eight years later Jim. Jordan started kindergarten in Denver.

What is most interesting to me, however, is that I cannot relate or recognize myself in these photos. I know it is me, but I watch her curiously as if I had never met her before; she with the raccoon eyes and the teased hairdo. Who is this woman who cares for baby after baby, who skips around 8 little girls playing “duck, duck, gray duck”, who is teaching this one to swim, who presents the birthday cakes to the birthday child? And what must it be like for her to have that dark handsome man at her side painting the garage, playing with her children, laughing with her over frosting spread all over Jimmy’s face at his first birthday

After the viewing, I sit and ponder why it is that she is such a stranger to me? When did all the 15,140 days pass and why does it seem that they never occurred tho I know they did.