Selected, Selective Images of Mother

In my 20s I was only interested in idealized images of my mother. In fact, I kind of preferred images of the young Evelyn that didn't much resemble the mother I remembered. I had these two young images blown up and put them in decorative frames, although they brought back no memories of my actual life with Mother.

In later decades I've been more attracted to images of Evelyn as a (young) mother. Uncle Harvey has collected many albums of family photos, lovingly enlarged and copied in sepia. This one of my mother visiting her mother's house with my two brothers makes me want to hug her, and offer to wash some of the diapers in those diaper pails--with two boys born a year apart, she clearly needs help.

And here is one of the best images of all--my mother holding me. Finally, a daughter! (Not that I didn't generate as many, or more, diapers and hassles than my brothers.) Her sharply flipped hair somehow echoes the vivid joy in her face.