FAMILY SHARING

Sometimes I think I should sponsor a bill making it a felony not to write the names of people on the back of those old family photographs! Let’s face it, if we fail the chore, when we’re gone (pass on into history as it were) no one else in the family will have a clue who the heck those folks are in the box of photographs and old photo albums – not to mention the slides.

Like most everyone else, I have a zillion old family photos (even some dating into the 1800s), plus boxes of old color slides - they’re part of our family history. So I took a break Sunday from legislative business (forgive me!), and started scanning old photos/slides and burning them onto CDs (with captions) to send out to my kids. I try to repair the old photos with a computer picture editing program (I use primarily Photoshop Elements) to bring them back to life as best I can.

As a lot of people know, I’m a “wannabe-be” photographer and my legislative offices both in Anchorage and here in Juneau capitol office are replete with landscape photos (US Sen. Barry Goldwater was also a photographer, and he didn’t get elected president either!). Frankly, I think my hobby photos are pretty good, and nothing boosts my ego more than coming home with a great photograph. Check out the link to my photos on my official legislative web site (the photographs are also on my political web site, but I dasn’t mention that!). But the photo work I did today was also rewarding because I’m sharing something really nice with my kids. Family sharing with family is what family is all about.