A picture is worth…a thousand memories. Well, maybe not “selfies.” They’ve become the concert ticket, postcard, scorecard, deli menu, and other trinkets and memorabilia we’d put in the underwear drawer for reminiscing when laundry was way behind schedule.

A thousand selfies are worth one or two words. Or one question: “Didn’t we just do this?” I can barely look at a selfie except if taken after a meal so I can inspect for spinach stuck in the canned smile.

But a picture… a candid… a true memory of people being who they are without a pose or filter…

A picture… the ones that take your breath away when you see them again. Not a snapshot in time, but a chapter. A thousand feelings and thoughts. So many moments leading to the moment and so many after. A thousand words are not enough, can’t fully capture the moment. And how its meaning grew over time…

Remember when?

Like what happened the moment after the picture, the three of us awash in a wave. Then a wave of gratitude for the moment. So much within that frame. The best of life and slices of personality that are hard to capture. How many times we ended up like this. On land or sea…

I remember when…and just like then when smiles captured so much. I can’t stop smiling.

photo credit: Melanie Panepinto, a.k.a. “Mom”