Discoveries
Feb. 27th, 2009 06:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bitchy_merlinThis afternoon, I found my mom's old tape recorder. It's an immense (by today's standards) plastic rectangular box, measuring 22 x 13.5 x 6cm (l, h, w) with a stiff black leather case, which is in remarkably good shape considering my mom got this when she was maybe 9, and she's fifty now. So I turned it on and plugged it in, and after a few minuted of fiddling with the cassettes (ok, look, I can't remember that last time I've seen a cassette tape, let alone use one), I finally got it to work. What do I hear? My mom when she was approximately my age, singing classic songs with her cousin, Kathy.
Upon realizing what I'm hearing, two thoughts occur to me:
1. I have blackmail material for the rest of my life.
2. This is probably the coolest thing ever. I mean, seriously, come on. There are recordings of my mom's cousins here, and of the people who have grown up to raise my cousins. For the record, it's an incredibly strange experience to hear mom at 17 singing "It's Only Words" accompanied by mom at fifty standing right beside me. <.<
Another reason I find this absolutely fascinating is because I'm not at all close with the relatives on that side of the family. They're kind of abstract notions that materialize awkwardly at family gatherings and then disappear afterward to... who knows where. I would be the first to admit that I have no idea what their childhoods were like; what it was like to be the children who grew up hearing about the times in the internment camps in Slocan and Kaslo and New Denver. So these tapes, they kind of... hearing them, I can see the two girls siting on the rumpled bed in the apartment. I can hear the faint babble of voices from the main room, of people laughing and talking, and I realise I know those people. It's so strange. Like in the books you read when you were young, the ones where the hero/ine looked up in th attic and found an ancient treasure thing that opened up new worlds. That's kind of what this is. Moments from their childhood. Kathy singing wayyyyy out of tune (according to mom). New Year's Day at the Sano's. My mom's favourite songs when she was seventeen.
What an incredible discovery.
I'm going to try and post an audio file here so that it can be immortalized on the internet.
Also, this
Upon realizing what I'm hearing, two thoughts occur to me:
1. I have blackmail material for the rest of my life.
2. This is probably the coolest thing ever. I mean, seriously, come on. There are recordings of my mom's cousins here, and of the people who have grown up to raise my cousins. For the record, it's an incredibly strange experience to hear mom at 17 singing "It's Only Words" accompanied by mom at fifty standing right beside me. <.<
Another reason I find this absolutely fascinating is because I'm not at all close with the relatives on that side of the family. They're kind of abstract notions that materialize awkwardly at family gatherings and then disappear afterward to... who knows where. I would be the first to admit that I have no idea what their childhoods were like; what it was like to be the children who grew up hearing about the times in the internment camps in Slocan and Kaslo and New Denver. So these tapes, they kind of... hearing them, I can see the two girls siting on the rumpled bed in the apartment. I can hear the faint babble of voices from the main room, of people laughing and talking, and I realise I know those people. It's so strange. Like in the books you read when you were young, the ones where the hero/ine looked up in th attic and found an ancient treasure thing that opened up new worlds. That's kind of what this is. Moments from their childhood. Kathy singing wayyyyy out of tune (according to mom). New Year's Day at the Sano's. My mom's favourite songs when she was seventeen.
What an incredible discovery.
I'm going to try and post an audio file here so that it can be immortalized on the internet.
Also, this
