Photographs – yes, the real ones that you can flick through – age like a fine wine. Possessively, I cling to my old dusty tombs (despite my husband thinking they take up too much room) and I will not let them go. For, despite severely neglecting them, when I do happen to be in the mood to flick through them (a word that will become obsolete when applied to images) a whole world of memories are unleashed – wanted and unwanted. A five minute glimpse into an album can find you still sitting there hours later. Faces from the past. Faces you no longer know. Faces that bring you peace.

I’m not certain that digital images hold the same power over us but only time will tell…

‘If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.’

I gazed on pictures from my teenage years and could remember what I was thinking and feeling, even though I’m a different person now, even down to why I was wearing that outfit and how I’d styled my hair that day; that flaming passion I held for ridiculous pop groups and movie stars! I’d like to be that person again for a day, walk around in those trendy shoes and go and spend my money on music magazines and sweets. Only a day though. Relics.

It was the pictures of the people in my life at the time that really drew my attention: a much younger version of my mum; my laughing sisters; our cats who were such an important part of our lives – was life simpler then? With age comes experience and it is inevitable that we become somebody else but I never realised just how much. I look at these people (and myself) as sweet strangers. Life has changed us all, and some of us are sadly not so close, but I do remember those days when we were and a picture can transport you straight back. The people maybe older but if you peel back their layers? They’re just like they were in the pictures. Keep hold of that, like you keep hold of the pictures.

‘The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.’