On my trip back home, I went through old family albums and found some priceless photos. Photos of moments forgotten by fallible human memory. Unlike myself, my papa was so good at recording these moments - on old film cameras and chunky video cameras. He would be in the corner of the room, quietly observing and recording the most ordinary of days. But mediocre days back then become priceless decades later as today, I get to see my late grandfather's smile and hear his voice on screen as he walked little me across the garden. Moments like that fly by so fast, like in a blink of an eye and I am grateful that my papa was so patient and steadfast in his recording of them.
Since they were first taken, the photos now have gracefully aged with time. And like everything else, there will come a day where these photos will cease to be identified. I guess this is where digital photos come in - memories can now be preserved forever in simple and accessible hard disks. But there is also the personal conundrum of being in the moment, and recording the moment for later. I am so bad at taking photos or videos of things that I would like to remember because I wanted to experience things through my own eyes rather than a phone screen. This is why I came back from a three week holiday in Malaysia with a measly few photos to account for it.
I would probably need to find a balance, to take more photos and videos and to not feel so awkward in recording moments. Because when I am old and grey, I would really would like to have the opportunity to reminisce on my good old days. On a comfortable couch, a cup of tea in hand, probably looking at holograms or a virtual reality experiences (or whatever young people will invent in the future) of old memories, untarnished by time.
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