Back in the day
Born in 1902, my grandmother had outlived many of her friends, my grandfather, and even (sadly) a sister (my aunt.) She would listen to the radio and clap at the end of each fictitious, scripted program that was acted out by actors,a s was teh style of the time. She never owned a television: “Nonsense” she called it, but did have the radio or a record playing all day. She had a library in a wing of her home. The wall of her stairwell was tightly tiled with black and white family photographs, all stately and elegant, in gorgeous hand cared frames and all reminiscent of eremarks and palpable happiness.
Back then, wedding photography in new york city was a different animal. Her album is something she often takes out and shows us, never when food is on the table, or any coffee that can spill on it, but when we are together and in need of quietude and appreciation. She walks us through the streets of Lowe Manhattan as it looked in the twenties, horse carriages and “coppers” dotting the backgrounds. Her betrothed, my grandfather, wore a top hat and tails, and her dress was simple and plain, not frouffy or complex, as they tend to be today. I miss these days when we all sat together like this. But I still have the album, and it means more to me than anything I own.