There are a lots of things that take me down memory lane, things that turn back the hands of time, even unintentionally. A certain perfume smell, songs, clothing styles and most especially, photos.

I was back home for the holidays some years ago when I decided to clean living room shelf with piles and piles of photo albums scattered around, just gathering dust. What would be a 30 minute plan to complete the job took me almost one whole day. Before I knew it, I was sitting there, scanning the albums page after page, looking at the photos smiling, giggling, sometimes crying. Suddenly, it seems that I was not staring at life scenes printed on paper. It was as if I was travelling back in time and experiencing the whole thing again.

There were baby pictures of my brothers who were bald headed, chubby cheeked burlies before they became men of big voices that they are now. I was in almost every picture carrying them, playing with them. Ah, life was so uncomplicated before! Then there were my photos of my first day in grade school, my very first identification photo that made me step back in time to when I was a girl with a missing front tooth who hesitated to smile for the camera. I remembered the hallway to my first classroom, even the smell of the freshly baked bread at the canteen came back to me like magic.

When I picked up another album with my high school photos, I was completely out of the present world I am in. Instantly, I am away in my thoughts imagining all my friends and that phase in my life I still consider as the best. It was fun to see the clothes my friends and I wore during that time. I could never imagine having to wear those right now! and how come I had that small waistline? I mean, I never even exercised and ate all I want before…

For the first time in many years, I actually skipped lunch that day, too engrossed at the time travel experience. With one final look, I caught the photo of someone I really liked and those butterflies in the stomach that I thought were long dead flapped its wings again. I couldn’t help but smile. What a beautiful journey I just had.

This writing exercise is fueled by the writing prompt “time travel” at Sunday Scribblings.