...all the yesterdays...

Prior to his turning 12, I sat down with my son and went through some of our old photo albums.  What fun it was to waste a few hours telling him our story.  The real delight though, came as a surprise.  The surprise moments when he filled in some of the pieces that I had forgotten.  The pieces that for him, made the whole.  

For example, there was a picture from the playground at the park near our old home.   I was telling him how much we loved it there...how we walked the several blocks over almost daily and spent our evenings there from spring to fall.  I was painting him a picture of our time there, when he surprised me and added in his own color.  The chill of spiky blades of grass getting in between his toes on a spring day.  The way the trees cupped together and dimmed the sound.  The springy texture of the woodchip-lined pathway through the woods.  

Another photo-this one from his special needs preschool. Once again, he supplied the details.  The smell of the chair he didn't like...the way it burnt in his nostrils.  The safe solidity of the heavy wooden blocks.  And the curious and somewhat terrifying lightness of the spiky plastic pieces with holes in them.  The bus driver's deep voice and the comforting way it vibrated in his ears.

Home...where Mami moved the furniture a lot but it was ok, because she never moved herself.  Home...where it always felt like a soft feather even when it was cold and dark. 

When he was much, much younger I once told him that photo albums are nothing more than books. Books full of stories about all the yesterdays.  And sometimes, in those early days when he was still struggling to communicate verbally, he would ask me to take a picture of something.  He would ask "Mami, can you make a yesterday?".

We sat on the bed, in a nest made out of pillows and blankets.

One of his favorite things right now is to build a nest in which to settle down and cuddle and be soothed, with his Mami and his Henry and his Katja Noel. 

Anyhow, we sat there all tangled up and flipped through photos.   All cozy and warm.  Telling stories. Asking questions. Groaning in embarrassment. Giggling like madmen. 

Reminiscing.

Reliving.

Remembering.

I wish there were a picture of that. 

I wish that was a yesterday. 

Instead, it's but a memory.  A written down one, but a memory nonetheless. Not a picture he'll add colour to in years to come. Not a yesterday. 

I can fill in the blanks for myself, of course.  I can remember how the whole room was bathed in sunlight.  How every once in a while, one of the birds in the bush near the window would trill out that spring was coming.  How his favourite candle scented the air.  

But that's not enough. That's not everything. That's just my half, not the whole.  

Without his impression...his senses...his expression, it's just a picture in grayscale. 

It's putting the two pieces together that colours in the photo. 

It's putting the two pieces together that creates a lifetime of yesterdays...