At this point I’ve decided to make a mini-collage of the numerous pictures taken throughout the day of me, alone, since that was how I spent much of it.  Maybe I’ll include a picture of the sign on the men’s room door, since that’s where the boys spent most of the time.  Look, there I am walking around to each table thanking family members for their gifts, alone.  There’s me with the baby (again, protected by white), alone.  There we are again, alone.  We will use that black Sharpie again to cross that phony smile off of my face; it was all an act, anyway.

Next, the birthday picture:  no primary colors here; let’s stick with the black—no, let’s use those happy colors, and decorate the page first with stickers of balloons and birthday favors, then grab my favorite black Sharpie and scribble all over that, too.  Then we can lay the picture down over that.  Someone had to fetch the boys from the bathroom when they wanted to bring out my cake.  My daughter’s father grabbed the microphone from the DJ and sang to me.  Wasn’t that sweet?  Because it was all a phony, bullshit act to make him look like a wonderful man I will cover his face with the picture of the mannequin’s face that I cut out from a magazine. And I will cover my own face with a picture of a clown with his phony smile.  Yes, that’s it!

Wow!  This is coming out great, eh?

I will create pocket pages to hold the cards we got for the baby.  They will have to be black to match the other pages.  But before those pages, I will include two, blank, black pages to savor the memory of the fact that the boys went out after the party and didn’t return for two days—unless there is another color for feelings of abandonment?

Well?  What do you think?  Wouldn’t you consider this to be a truly fabulous scrapbook?  And won’t it be fun to show off to friends and family members?  And wouldn’t it be wonderful to pass this down to my daughter?

Yes, this whole exercise borders on the ridiculous.  But isn’t that what we do?  We take the unhappy memories we have of the past and exaggerate and emphasize them and create this huge mood that we carry around with us, then we pour that whole mood over our present and future and everyone who is a part of it. 

Maybe now, when you find yourself wallowing in past hurts you could try an exercise like this.  You could even create an actual page (just make sure to burn it when you are done!).  Make the whole mental image so ridiculous to yourself when you step back and look at it that the memory becomes somewhat distorted, then almost funny.  Then maybe you can let it go.

And possibly be a little happier now?