taking pictures

No matter how many times I look at pictures and think to myself how wonderful it is to have those moments captured, I fail to keep in mind that enjoying them later means taking them now.

One of the local area blogs has the occasional entry that features photographs and memories from yesteryear. I enjoy these immensely, thankful that someone took the time to snap the shutter on what my hometown looked like back in the '60s and '70s. For instance, a photo of the Big "C" tower that stood over the local shopping center for years and has since been made over to look more modern, but now has less personality too.

Even as I type this, I'm not making plans to go out and capture what my town looks like, anticipating how wonderful it will be to have such photographs sometime in the future. I should be keeping in mind to take pictures of family, particularly my nieces and nephews, even though as mostly grown-ups now they'll be changing less with time. I'm just thankful that we have so many pictures of them from when they were still growing up.

With the advent of the digital camera, it's not as expensive to take pictures as it once was with film. Just as with much of modern technology, I wonder how it affects the lives of those that are growing up in the digital age. Maybe I'm making the taking of pictures too much of an event or effort, whereas for the younger generation, it's something much more casual. After all, they can take pictures with their cell phones, can't they? On the other hand, discretion is important too (another modern conundrum with the ease of digital convenience) - but overall I'm glad that they are recording so many memories - it's really such a treasure to have.