Reality Scrapbooking

Some of the most profitable television shows today are reality-based. We watch people onscreen living day-to-day life, making mistakes along the way. We enjoy reality shows, why not reality scrapbooking? Why do we feel as historians that we must preserve only the good memories? We don’t live in a perfect world, so why would we want our scrapbooks to portray our life as perfect, when it’s not.

Next time you go to journal about an event, think about what REALLY happened. Did everything go as planned? Did everyone cooperate? Most likely, something went wrong. Amy Stultz wanted her husband’s birthday to run smoothly. Her plan was to make the birthday cake with her daughter Lucy. What a great opportunity to scrapbook Lucy learning how to bake. However, Lucy did not want to bake the cake. Amy recalls, “She kept repeating over and over, ‘I’m too little to cook!’ I kept telling her, ‘No, you’re not!’ Eventually, Lucy got down from her stool, and sat on the floor in full tantrum mode. Her arms and legs were crossed, and she refused to stand. I told her that her daddy would cry if she didn’t get up, and I bribed her with a Popsicle. She eventually got up, and as soon as the cake hit the oven, she demanded her Popsicle!”

Amy did get some photos of Lucy smiling, holding the cake box. Her first approach to scrapbook the picture was with a “Betty Crocker” layout. Lucy looks happy; the viewer is lead to believe that she was excited to bake the cake. The real story would have been forgotten if Amy had not later decided to add this companion page to that layout titled, “I’m too little to cook!” telling how awful the experience was.

In my layout titled, “My, Big, Fat, Armenian Thanksgiving”, I journal about what really happens on Thanksgiving. Everybody shows up at different times, but as soon as I walk in the door a thick cloud of cigarette smoke, which I am allergic to, greets me. Not to mention, I don’t want my kids inhaling smoke. My uncles are glued to the television, and my aunts are competing with the television and each other to be heard. Finally, we sit down to eat. We have a feast that my grandmother has spent all morning preparing for us, with all the best authentic Armenian food. Unfortunately, my grandmother is so busy serving other people, that by the time she sits down, we’re almost done eating, and her food is cold. I can hear her now, “That’s okay, I’ll eat later.”

I am not trying to complain about what we do on Thanksgiving, I’m simply writing what really happens. There will come a time when my grandmother will no longer be here, and I will no longer have authentic Armenian food. At that time, Thanksgiving will be very different. If I did not journal about Thanksgiving at Grama’s, future generations would never know how my grandmother was always the last to eat. This is just a perfect example of her selflessness.

The next time you are faced with a pile of pictures of a family event, I challenge you to tell the real story. Did dad lock the keys in the car at the gas station? Did you drop the dessert on the way to the pitch-in? Reality based scrapbooking can be a bit un-flattering, however it helps to tell the true story of your life.