I really wasn't sure who to tag since I'm not sure who checks our blog on a regular basis. I guess I could go off who leaves the most comments, but I didn't want to discourage anyone from leaving comments in the future. ;o) The other hard part of this for me is the way I organize my picture file. There isn't any fourth picture in my picture folder, just folders with titles like: "2000-2004" and "2005-2009". Inside the "2005-2009" folder there is a folder for every year in that span and inside each of those are folders numbered 01-12 for each month of the year. Inside each month are folders named after events at which we took pictures during that month. I'm sure by now you can see why opening the "My Pictures" folder and posting the fourth picture just isn't that simple. You're also either admiring my great organizational skills or feeling grateful that you're not as anal-retentive as your good friend Trisha ;o)
Notwithstanding my hesitations, I persevered, opened the 2008 folder, opened the fourth folder inside it (April) and saw that there were only two pictures in the folder. I was confused only for a second before memories and the emotions attached to them flooded my mind. I remembered that early this year we lost a hard drive in our desktop computer--one we hadn't backed up for months. Strangely enough, the only thing we really lost were pictures. Ken mostly uses his laptop, I keep my documents on a USB thumb drive so I can access them anywhere, and our home videos were kept on another, larger hard drive in the same computer since they took up so much room. Other than a few documents I'd saved to the desktop, pictures were the only thing really on that hard drive aside from the operating system and software. And those could just be installed again from the discs we bought them on. The problem was, with the craziness of adding a new baby to our family we'd gotten out of the habit of backing up our hard drive. By the time the thing began to click it was too late.You may already know that I'm really attached to my pictures--for me they are a tangible manifestation of my life. As sick as I was about losing 6+ months of our lives, including a couple family reunions, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas, it was much worse to me that, with the exception of a few pictures we'd had developed to give to friends and family, every picture we'd taken of Keitra since her birth was just gone! It may sound silly or shallow but I really almost felt like someone had died. I went through all the stages of the grieving process. I'm sure the fact that postpartum depression was settling upon me at that point in my life only deepened my despair.
We searched online for data recovery services and found out we could spend anywhere from a few hundred dollars to over a thousand to try to get our data back. After agonizing over it for a couple of months, we decided it was worth a few hundred dollars to us if we could get those pictures back. We found a company that wouldn't charge us unless they could recover our data. If they could only recover part of the lost files they would also call us and tell us what they were able to recover before they actually did anything, so we could make the informed decision whether to go ahead or not. They would use data recovery software and also attempt to repair the hard drive itself, if necessary. We also found out that because they were professionals that them opening the hard drive wouldn't void the warranty we still wanted to take advantage of. It was absolutely our best foot forward. Unfortunately that hard drive was so far gone that even a physical repair couldn't save it...
Two pictures in an otherwise empty folder. Two little ones playing and smiling together. Two minutes for the memories to completely wash over me, for me to fully relive the emotion behind the back story. Two hours later, I finally see the pictures themselves, pouring over the smiles and remembering the giggles from the actual moment they were taken. Months after the fact, I realize that today I have a few hundred pictures of our little girl, all digitally backed up in a couple of locations. I also have enough pictures from her first months, that we printed before the death of our hard drive or that were taken by friends and family, to set my heart at peace about the whole thing. The wave of memories and emotion rushes past, the waters recede and I'm left to treasure what I have right now.
4 comments:
I'm commenting! I know I don't feel like people read my blog that much either because I get few comments and none from people I would think I would but I hear it gets read. I do read yours although I probably only check it once a week or so. Depends on how crazy life is! I'm sure you understand. :) So I am one of those people that is completely amazed by your organization skills of how your picture files are organized on your computer. Completely amazed! Ours are in complete caos and it is a goal of mine to organize our picture files over the Christmas break. Wish me luck! I'm sorry to hear about the hard drive situation but I am impressed by your optimism to count your blessings. You rock. Love you and miss you so much! See you in two weeks!!! Sorry this is a WAY long comment. I probably should have just emailed you.
I totally know what you mean about organizing pictures! A couple years ago I was getting really fed up! I figured, what's the point of having all these digital pictures if I can't find them when I need them? They might as well not exist! My system might sound complicated, but my whole point was to make it as easy and sustainable as possible. In theory, now that I have a folder set up for every month of every year, I sit down the first Sunday of every month and unload all the pictures for the last month off our camera onto the computer. It's easy for me to remember to do it because it's tied to Fast Sunday, which happens every month at church. It's easy for me to remember when things happened when it was only a month ago, and it doesn't take very long to organize them into folders by event when I do it regularly like that. As the final step, I back up all the new pictures on our external hard drive, stick it in our fire-safe box and tah-dah! Organization and peace of mind!
Reading about losing your pictures really tore at my heart - we have a similar problem. When we moved to New Jersey, we about 6 months' worth of pictures off of our computer. Since then (3 years), Steve has finally found a few of them, but he can't get them off of our computer because it's an old computer (no zip drive, no CD burner, no nothing). They were on the hp photo website, but that changed to a different website and they've lost all the photos we'd stored on it as well. So basically, we've lost hald of Charlotte's first year of life. At home. We have all the pictures we took while she was in ICU, but we have very few pictures of her at home in UT. Lost her 1st Christmas, lost Easter, lost everything. I cry over it. And there's no way of getting any of it back. So I totally understand how you feel, and I'm so sorry it happened to you too! I've learned my lesson, I have to be quick about ordering hard copies of everything.
Anyway - here's hoping it never happens again!
What a sad story. I'm attached to my pictures also and I'm organized like crazy too (not quite that organized). I also admire your ability to see the bright side of things. And your children are so cute! They look like they really like each other.
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