Dad passed away on the 1st of November.

Denver and I made the long trek back to Indiana for a week of family, mourning, laughter, tears, and saying goodbye.

While there, I became the keeper of the photographs.  The box of print photos from my youth to Denver’s youngest days.

At one point my mom had the entire case organized precisely by date, occasion, location, and all of that…

With dad’s Parkinson’s, he’d get on these binges of activity.

One of those that frequently happened, was him going through the pictures.

The box is chaos. A mess of photos mixed up into unorganized groups that have little to do with each other.

I began the painstaking process of organizing them so I could scan them into the computer for a digital archive.

And then I had to pause.

In the middle of the chaos of the group I was working on were 4 pictures.

4 pictures that had a similar theme.

They’re pictures of my parents. Just the two of them. No kids, no friends…just them.

Smiling, happy.

Like that’s what he wanted to see.

Just dad and mom. Together. 

It’s what I needed to see, too.

Sometimes it’s easy to forget how much they loved each other.

But this little reminder brought it all to the surface.

I knew he’d left this treasure for one of us to find.

I’m glad it was me.