Exercise #2 - Photos of Family

Imagine that you are browsing through an old family album, looking at photographs, clippings, and other memorabilia. Suddenly you spot something that surprises you.

I was staying at my parent's house for a while as an adult and noticed that there were no pictures on the wall. They had many framed pictures of the family, but they had not gotten around to hanging them since they had moved into the new townhouse a year or so back. I remembered seeing, usually on television shows, how people hang a bunch of framed pictures on the wall leading up the stairs and thought it might be fun to surprise them with that. I found a hammer and nails and sporadically began to arrange the pictures onto the wall. It looked really nice. There were pictures taken at Sears with coupons, and my sister's senior picture, and a picture of me from high school and my baby sister before her prom. But one picture caught my eye.
My dad and mom and younger sister and I were all sitting on a piano bench in front of a small piano at my grandmother's house. My grandmother lived in Grangeville Idaho and we lived in Milwaukee Wisconsin. We never had money to fly so we drove out to see her and my great grandmother a time or two (I honestly don't remember if it was one time or two) during my childhood years. This was when I was about 9 and my sister around 4. My youngest sister had yet to be born.
I stopped and looked at that picture for a while. My parents must have been about 30 years old at the time and I was now 32 years old. A young cancer survivor with no children yet and no prospects for one for a few more years as I finished taking Tamoxifen for the prescribed 5 years. How strange the passing of years, the changing of society's expectations. Myself, feeling so old, yet really so young. How must my parents' life have been, so young with two small children. I feel barely old enough now (34) to think of being a mature parent, with so many years of living and teaching under my belt.
They looked so young and pretty and happy. How old will I be when I have a 9 year old? I am thinking about 44 at the youngest. I know this is normal, but will I be full enough of energy to participate in my kid's life as much as I want. Will the child keep me young?

Fred thought that I needed more of an interesting ending to Exercise #1. Hmmmmm. Maybe I just peter out as I get to the end and then have no idea what to write. It happens when I write e-mails as well.