This album is tucked away in a closet. It is kept in a big plastic bag because it really is disintegrating. I have to put a cloth or paper (kitchen) towels down on surfaces because the cover is turning to dust.
I started taking pictures of it because I think I have to get rid of it and find a new album for these folks. The pages have all come loose from the binding.
I don't know most of the people in this heavy book, but at the very back are my great-great-grandparents and one of their sons, my great-grandfather.
Abbie and John Richman (great-greats)
Mother's father's father's mother and father
And this serious boy, I remember. Herbert Richman
He was in his late 80s when I was born. He'd sit in his living room and just watch us play when we came over, so by then he must have been 90. He was quiet and my great-grandmother made up for it. I know he was a baptist, never came downstairs in the morning without shaving and dressing and wore a tie even to mow the lawn! He watched us playing intently, leaning forward in his chair. Maybe thinking this same thing -Time goes so quickly.
It is just rushing by, much faster than we know.
I try to imagine these people's lives and remember that they breathed and moved. All the fuss they must have had to go to on the day they were having their pictures taken. How these parents watched and wondered about their son. Prayed for him. They are gone and the earth barely remembers them.
Today I'm praying that my family and friends who still aren't surrendered to Christ would feel the rush of time as it passes by. How short this life is and then comes an unhurried eternity...wholly with or completely without God. No in between.
