From the Desk of Nettio Designs Issue No. 13
Back in January, when I first introduced From the Desk of Nettio Designs and this whole idea of creatively capturing your life adventures, one of the questions I was asked was if I would talk about how I capture the negative in our lives as well. In light of recent events at the Boston Marathon on Monday, today seems like an appropriate time to share a little bit about that.
I’ve never been to Boston and I didn’t know anyone who ran or attended the Boston Marathon. But as a military spouse, hearing about improvised explosive devices and amputations happening on US soil hits a little too close to home. These are known risks in my husband’s line of work – risks we accept while hoping and praying for everyone’s safe return. In a very sad but very real way, these types of stories or injuries are considered somewhat normal in our little military-driven world. But we expect to hear about them in foreign overseas locations not on our home turf.
What happened in Boston was a terrible and senseless tragedy. These were sports fans and family and friends cheering on their loved ones. They had no reason to think they’d be in any danger and my heart absolutely breaks for every single one of the families and individuals whose lives have been forever changed by this one horrific event.
When tragedies like this strike, I think it raises a lot of questions about our responsibilities as memory keepers, especially for those those of us participating in every day storytelling like Project Life where so much focus is on day-to-day events.
- Do we have a responsibility to future generations to include these types of events in our scrapbooks?
- Do we act as a reporter and share the facts or should we dig deep and share how these events affect us personally?
- If we choose to leave out these stories, choose to focus on the good in our lives instead of the bad, will that somehow make our story less authentic?
My answer to all of these questions is that you should do whatever feels true to your personal story. Whether that’s saving a newspaper article, journaling your personal emotions or leaving these events out of your scrapbooks entirely, it’s your choice.
It’s not your responsibility to tell everyone’s story. It’s only your responsibility to tell your story. How you choose to tell that story is entirely up to you.
For me personally, I tend to approach these events from my own personal perspective. I will likely never scrapbook a layout detailing the facts of an event like 9/11. I figure there are plenty of news accounts available if some day someone wanted to read about what happened. But I may one day scrapbook the story of our visit to Ground Zero and how as a military family it affected us eight years after the event. Because that is what is true to my story.
The same is true for the Boston Marathon tragedy. Right now I think I will likely include a journaling card in my Project Life spread for this week with some of my personal thoughts on what happened because that’s what feels true to my own life experiences. Your approach may be totally different and that’s perfectly ok.
It saddens me that we live in a world where tragedies like this happen. But negative experiences and events are a very real part of life and I think it’s healthy for us as memory keepers to maintain a dialogue about how we approach these types of events in our lives. So with that I want to know:
Do you scrapbook the good with the bad? How do you approach these types of stories and events?
Rather than end this week with my usual jolly send-off, I’m just going to share this great quote from comedian Patton Oswalt:
“So when you spot violence, or bigotry, or intolerance or fear or just garden-variety misogyny, hatred or ignorance, just look it in the eye and think, “The good outnumber you, and we always will.”
Thoughts and prayers to everyone in Boston.
This post is Issue No. 13 of my From The Desk of Nettio Designs weekly email series. Want to get in on the action? Sign up for Nettio Designs emails here.
I’ll be the first to answer your question. My answer is yes, I will always record the good and the bad. I want my journals to be an honest representation of what my life was, not just the fun times. And this is not meant in any way as whining, but some lives are more challenging than others. I look around in the world and see how people live their lives with just moderate ups and downs, a lovely childhood, great teen/single life, dating, happily married etc. for me it never has been this way, from the moment I was born my life was a struggle. I will not go into detail but one therapist I was assigned to( that’s how it works in Europe) told me he was amazed I was still alive. I guess he meant it as a compliment but I didn’t feel it that way. For me it was an acknowledgement that other people saw my life was messed up and that it was a reality.
I always focussed on the good things in my life sometimes they are so small you would hardly notice them but I saw and see them and hold on to them. I choose to make journals like my Project Life after I became bedridden due to a neurological illness. I want to leave my journals for my family and their family, I want them to know who I was and how our life as world travelers and expats was. I focus on the stories in the different countries, the cultures but I also record my daily life and that’s not all fun and party. There are treatments to go through, painful procedures but also happy times with my therapy dog, baking something yummy with the help of my husband, rolling into the yard to soak up some nice weather in my wheelchair, there are sad times that I feel homesick for my daughter who still lives in Europe, my 2 grand babies I have not met or held yet but than there is the joy of Skype and Apple’s FaceTime and daily contact on Facebook. All these ups and downs make it into my Project Life book because I want it to be a reflection of my life.
I will record the tragedy of this week, but only my reaction to it. Like you wrote there is enough media coverage. I hope by recording my reaction they might learn something when a similar event(lord forbid) would occur in their life. I’ve lived through many bombings while living in Europe and learned resilience. I hope to pass this on. People in America have lived a relative sheltered life wrt to terrorism in comparison to Europe but I see resilience grow after each and every attack, it’s a sad thing that this is happening but people are pulling together and refuse to let this bring them down. I have seen and went to the same process in Ireland and the UK. I will journal about it and hope that a positive message will make its way to the hearts of the ones who someday will read it.
Sorry for turning this into a novel, it’s a subject close to my heart.
Lovely quote Lynnette, thanks for sharing. Will print it out.
Love this Christine, thanks so much for sharing! I’ve always looked at my albums as journals as well so I love hearing how you do that too. 🙂