Time is on Time's Side

Years ago, I wrote my Grandma Charlotte (Falcheck Duttinger) Entz and asked her for photos of her and my grandfather, who died when I was 2.  She sent me some other things at the time, including this post card above that my father sent her from boot camp.  Love this.  And also this photo of Dad in front of the Duttinger homestead in Gates in his sailor suit.  Must be about 1964 or 65.  Sometimes it's hard to relate theses mementos to the man who raised me; he looks so young here and black and white has a way of making things seems even....farther away.  Dad feels both closer and farther away these days.  Adam called him Santa in a photo I was showing him.  Sad because he doesn't remember him anymore, but Santa and my Dad....not too far off from each other.

Adored this picture from the time I unearthed it as a young teen in my mother's closet and had it with me ever since.  Dad was so handsome.  The story he told me is that he didn't have his dress uniform with him, so the photographer gave him a naval bomber jacket to pose in, even though he wasn't a pilot.  Over the years, whenever anyone has seen this photo, they have stopped to look.  "Whose the guy who looks like Elvis?" I've heard more than once.  My handsome young Dad.

Kevin found an old newspaper under the floor in the upstairs bathroom.  Very well preserved. He said it looked like it was used to shimy the board.  September 20, 1893.  Not long after the house was built, which has been a duplex for at least 80 years.  Loved the old advertisements and the feature length article on a set of triplets born somewhere else in the country.

Streets were listed that don't exist anymore.

And there were plenty of advertisements aimed towards those arriving off the boats.  Including a whiskey guy in Rochester.

Be sure to get a piano from Foster and Co!

In the center, you can see the photo of the triplets.

 It doesn't matter what businesses open and close, who is born and dies.  Time has a way of flying by when you least expect it.  When this person stuck that paper in the floor (I picture him yelling to his wife GRAB ME TODAY'S PAPER I can't get this floor even!)...do you suppose he pictured me taking photos of it 120 years later with a digital camera and uploading it my computer to put on my blog?  And when my Dad posed for those photos as a very young man (actually, he was 17 when he went into the military....he lied to the recruiter because his Dad told him to get a full time job or join so he joined), do you think he could imagine his four kids, his five grandkids and me taking a digital photo and uploading it?? Nope.

I wonder what my kids and grandkids will think of this blog in 40 years.  Laugh at the basic technology?  The difference: they'll know what I was thinking.  That's why I write it.