I’ve had these pictures on my phone, ready to post for over a month now. But I haven’t. Because I didn’t know what to write.
Because I didn’t understand how they made me feel.
You’re probably thinking I’m crazy because these are just photos of me. But, let me tell you a story.
The evening before these photos were taken was just like any other. Except that we discovered that our kitchen sink had been leaking for an indeterminate amount of time and that we needed a new faucet, pronto.
So, the next day we headed off to the hardware store, Lucas in tow. We decided to make an afternoon of it. A little shopping, a few groceries, and a shiny new faucet. I decided to wear something other than my mom uniform and instead, I came up with this comfy-chic look you see before you. I was, and am, all for pajamas that can be passed off as dress pants.
But, this story isn’t about comfy dress pants.
Since I liked my outfit, I asked hubby if we could stop the car and get a quick snap on our way. Like most of my photos, it’s not a result of an elaborate photo shoot or production. Kingston is pretty and picturesque. It’s not hard to pull over and get a quick, Instagram-worthy shot. This is how it usually goes down, it’s not often planned.
There was nothing remarkable about the day or these photos, although they turned out pretty darn nice (great job hubby).
It was just a wonderfully normal sunny Saturday afternoon like any other.
Fast forward to today. It’s Wednesday, April 8th, 2020. Moments before I started writing this post, I found myself looking for the date stamp for these pictures on my phone. Something I’m not sure I’ve ever done with blog images. I don’t usually pay much attention to the exact date, there’s no reason to. But for these, I did.
I needed to know the date.
Why? I think it’s because I have thought about the moment these photos captured many times. This completely normal, unremarkable, recurring moment. It was just another time my husband graciously agreed to take a photo of me to capture my outfit. I’m lucky to have that support be the norm. But now, here I sit. Needing to know the date so very badly.
They were taken on Saturday, March 7th, 2020.
I remember. The snow was just starting to melt. Signs of spring were everywhere. I straightened out my collar, set the camera settings up for hubby, and smiled in his direction. We hopped back in the car and continued on our way to lunch as a family. I remember calling my father-in-law on the way to coerce him into coming over that weekend to help us install the new faucet we were on our way to acquire. Admittedly, as first-time homeowners, we truthfully had no idea what we were doing.
This isn’t an exciting story. It’s just a day in the life. But I remember this all so vividly.
I had no idea that the day we snapped these photos would be the last time we would go out to do something as simple as have lunch and do a little shopping as a family.
That my extended family coming by to help us with our home repairs would be the last time we would see them, off-screen, for the foreseeable future.
I never thought that in a few short days the world would be turned upside down.
I’m sharing this particular set of photos because, for me, they now represent a perfectly wonderful yet uneventful day that stuck in my mind. I’ve stared at them on a few occasions, trying to make sense of the confusing emotions they bring forth. It doesn’t make sense. They’re just of me in an outfit I like, but even when I’m not looking at them, they remain in my mind.
I never thought I’d look back at these photos and reminisce about this regular humdrum day I now covet.
These photos make me long for normalcy.
They make me miss the little things, like putting Lucas in the shopping cart and seeing him smile like he did that day.
They cause me to remember silly moments. Like my mother-in-law and I, standing in our kitchen laughing at the sight of our men, belly up under the kitchen sink.
They make me wonder about when we’ll return to how things were.
They make me realize how we really don’t know what can so drastically change from one day to the next.
But most importantly, they make me feel grateful.
These photos make me feel more appreciative and grateful for my perfectly ordinary life than any in recent memory.
Because let’s be real. The lives many of us led before COVID-19, our busy lives, didn’t always allow for the time to practice gratitude in a meaningful way as often as we should have.
It takes a worldwide pandemic to make our conventional lives seem suddenly remarkable.
I want to remember what it feels like to be here. This strange daily reality. Because if I’m being honest about how I feel, I think sh!t is crazy out there right now. Is this really happening? Are we really living through a historical event?
And I want to remember this. I want to remember this unfamiliar existence. I want to be able to come back to this post and read these words when we’re back to that life. When we return to the hustle and bustle and are once again too busy and hurried to truly stop and feel deeply grateful.
What an exceptionally bizarre time we are living in.
But you know what? One day, our kids will ask about what this was like.
They will.
They’ll ask us what it was like to go outside and feel anxious about walking too close to strangers.
So surreal.
They’ll ask us if we really wore masks to go shopping for essentials. They’ll ask us about whether people really lined up outside the grocery store before being let in in small groups. They’ll ask us what it was like to wake up every day to hear more and more news about the virus. To be constantly inundated with new information via the devices in our pockets.
They’ll ask us about how we passed the time, what we did, and how long it lasted.
They may even ask us what we learned from it all.
And to that, I will tell my son that I learned the true meaning of gratitude. It sounds so cheesy I know. But hear me out.
Big lessons can be learned from horrible global pandemics.
Yes, huge scale, world-altering lessons too. But I’m speaking more personally here. Honestly, for the first time, I understand what it means to feel legitimately grateful for the little things in life that we so rarely slow down and feel thankful for. The things I took for granted. Because although there are pros to this self-isolating life (we’ve loved having hubby working from home with us, for example), it’s the little things that I miss.
Seemingly stupid things I miss? Wearing more than the same pair of sneakers. Seeing extended family. Thrift shopping. My mom. And mindlessly browsing Homesense and Winners.
So, I need your help.
I need you to help me spread this sense of gratitude for our regular, ordinary lives.
Because I’ve been asking myself, how do we collectively get through this? How do we manage? And I think this is one of the ways we cope with our new reality. Gratitude. A shared feeling of gratitude.
Because we need warm-fuzzy feelings right now more than ever.
Because when we eventually get back there, to our long workdays, to our offices, to our hectic schedules, I don’t want us to forget what we’ve learned. And yet, I’m willing to bet that as we return to our routines, it will happen so easily.
I don’t want to forget how badly we’re missing our regular lives right now.
Those weekly soccer games. The afternoons at the park. The date nights out.
I want to be reminded to feel immensely grateful for this life when it returns to normal. So how do we remind our future selves?
I think that all it takes is just one photo. One photo from our lives before Coronavirus
I think that’s all it takes. One photo that has the magic to make us stop and remember how good we had it. One photo that can remind us of how blessed we are to live our regular lives.
One photo to make us pause to feel appreciative of all things mundane and ordinary that we may miss right now.
Let’s immortalize our moments on a massive stage, with just one photo.
I think this one simple little act, added together and multiplied by many is just one small way we take care of collective selves, now and in the future.
#onegratitudephoto
I want you to find a photo. One taken before we knew what was coming.
A photo capturing your daily life before Coronavirus. A photo, or a few, that were taken shortly before we forcibly adopted this new normal. It doesn’t matter what the photo(s) is of. It can be a photo of you, an inanimate object, your pet, or someone else. It doesn’t have to make sense; most things don’t make much sense right now. It just has to elicit an emotional response for you. It has to represent something meaningful for you and you alone. Otherwise, no rules.
Just one image that elicits gratitude for our everyday lives.
And if you like, I’d love for you to share your photo with me on social media via whatever platform you prefer. Tag me @struckblog on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram in your #onegratitudephoto posts.
I hope you’ll let me reshare your photos, and help me to spread positivity, hope, and gratitude with others.
If you’re willing, you can write why the photo makes you feel grateful or what it makes you feel. Or, you can note nothing at all and keep it personal.
However you want to remind your future self to be grateful is ok.
That has been my only goal with this impromptu post. To share the story of one random day, that has unknowingly helped me to find gratitude and perspective in this strange unknown.
I hope joining me in finding and sharing your photo does the same for you.
And all this philosophical talk as a result of a random set of outfit photos on my phone. Who saw that one coming? Certainly not me.
#stayhome, stay safe.
Anna
