When he was 3 and just like Woody...

I'd mentioned that my son, who just graduated high school, once emulated Woody in "Toy Story." I came across this photo of him at age 3, asleep in his car seat, wearing the felt cowboy hat he rarely doffed, and holding tight to his firearm.  It should be noted, however, that the character Woody wore an empty holster.  I'm not sure if that was a nod to the non-violent toys crowd, or just a creative touch, for it's certain that Andy, or any kid who really plays with his toys, would quickly lose such a small accessory.

Toy Story does feature a set of green plastic molded soldiers who hold rifles.  I love that in the film they move by jumping, stuck to their thin plastic platforms.  And violence is hardly eschewed in the three Toy Story movie plots.  In fact, in the latest, there were moments when I hid my eyes, all the while telling myself that this was a cartoon.

In any case, here's my angelic cowboy son, dreaming of some preschool escapade.

"Toy Story 3" Parallels Real Life: Relinquishing Childhood

My children chide me for choking up over a print review for Toy Story 3.  I saw the movie at a preview this week, a feat of emotional fortitude given my son's high school graduation the day before.  In the Pixar masterpiece, Andy, the boy to whom the dozen toys are eternally dedicated, empties his room for his move to college.  Wait while I clear a tear.

 

But the review captured why this film is not only a visual achievement (especially in 3D as I saw it) but a dramatic one:  the emotional complexity expressed by its animated characters abuts reality.

The line that broke me in Joe Morgenstern's Wall Street Journal review was parenthetical, but capsulizes the loss my own son's graduation represents:  "The production is strewn with visual and verbal zingers, along with silent moments of great eloquence. (As a young man about to go out into the world, Andy takes Woody and Buzz from his toy box for one last time and, gazing fondly at them, relinquishes his childhood.)"

Relinquishes his childhood.  I hardly admit I've relinquished mine, but I certainly don't want to let go of my children's.  Their childhoods were not only happy, but made me happy.  My children as adults are people I respect, who I enjoy, but never again include the flights of imagination that Andy (John Morris), and in Toy Story 3, little Bonnie (Emily Hahn) create with their toys.  My son's own Buzz Lightyear and Woody were his favorites.  I must've heard "There's a snake in my boot!" hundreds of times.  My son even prized a felt cowboy hat that he wore incessantly, just like Woody's.

My children think it bizarre that I'm so sentimental.  But on the other hand, like Andy, they refuse to part with their dearest childhood toys. In the film, Andy's mom insists he sort the playthings in his long-untouched toybox into piles earmarked for a nearby preschool, the attic, or college.  In determining the toys' ultimate fate, issues of loyalty, emotional wounds, separation and death receive attention with great sensitivity, seamlessly woven into some of the most breathtaking and innovative scenes and angles on screen.

The night before the screening, at graduation, my husband and I were treated to a different film, a collage of my son's high school class, which included not only highlights from their four years together, but a baby snapshot and current photo of each of the 26 students.  The music for the video had been recorded on multiple tracks in my son's bedroom--his voice singing Vitamin C's "Graduation Song" accompanied by his strums on ukulele.

Part of the emotion is the parting of the generations.  I shared my children's childhoods, but I can't share their adulthoods.  These kids not only have Toy Story to remember the past, but they've got their own playlists, hard-drives of photos, Facebook pages, You Tube channels and all sorts of other permanent record of every moment and whim of their present lives. They manage their own images, presenting their persona to hundreds of "friends" in an instant (but of course they won't "friend" me!).

Nowadays, expectant parents create websites to showcase their ultrasounds--and from then on, endless documentation of every burp and giggle is available for anyone to click.  This not only stamps each baby with his own sense of importance--which may or may not be a good thing--but it preserves for today's kids their own lives, readily available for re-living anytime.

I've got a few faded photos from my childhood, but not much, really.  I didn't even get a digital camera until 2003, when our children were 16, 14 and 11.  On the other hand, how many reminders that those lively little children are now just shadows do I really want ?

Perhaps the charm of all three Toy Story movies is that certain classic joys of childhood remain consistent.  Mr. Potato Head, slinky dog, Barbie and the etch-a-sketch were primo Boomer toys that survived to link generations.  Now Woody, Buzz Lightyear and the three little green aliens will link today's graduates with their own children. In TS3, even the toys have computer expertise, surreptitiously using Mapquest to find their location.  Technology will change, but imagination and creativity continue.

Somehow, though, it's better being on the other side of the generation gap, with the thrill of reaching for a future still ahead of you.  The parental view is a vicarious one, desperately wishing the best for the ones to whom you've unreservedly given your heart, but sadly being unable to shape the future the way a mom determines and smooths life for her youngsters.

"Es la vida," shrugs a good friend--that's life.  But when you see Toy Story 3, you'll be transported to those magic years when you just knew that toys came alive when you went to sleep.  And even the toys in the attic are waiting patiently for childhood to return.

Kodak Moments

Just got a new camera. An upgrade of my old one, a Kodak...new one has twelve times optical zoom, image stablization, manual focus. I don't think I'm the only one in the world for whom taking photos is important--just look at the proliferation of photo upload sites, sharing sites, image manipulation software, printing options. Photos have become something different from what they were--when I was a kid, my dad loved taking slides but very rarely he'd spend the time sorting them into slide trays, setting up a screen and projector and putting on a show. So rarely, I have only vague remembrance of maybe one.
What that meant was that my childhood is largely just a shadow. I don't have any visualization of myself in, say, first grade. Or second grade, or third. There must be photos of me--or slides, somewhere in the collection of stuff my sister sent me from clearing out my parents' garage after their passing. But where? How do I sort through everything, or use the gadgets I bought for digitalizing what I find? I have a old few photos...I have one on my desk, with my mother standing in a pool, holding me in the water...my face looking down, mostly the view of a helmet of brown hair. I look to be about five or six.
Who was that person? I can't remember those days; where I was, how I really felt. But if I had photos to bring back those moments, I could recapture my childhood, and the relationships that formed me.
And that is why I am a fanatic about photography. I want to capture, to freeze-frame, the moments of my life. To document, to preserve. I don't want my children to grow up, leaving me only shadows of their lives, and I don't want them to find themselves like me, feeling warm and nostalgic and yet only having some fuzzy intangible, a few distorted scene fragments, to cling to. I want to remember especially my children, my moments with them, my youth, my time of health and energy, because I don't want to let it go.
And yet...when I see my photos of years ago, the small children who reached for me, who craved me and who cried when I left them with caretakers, I am sad. Where are those children? I felt at the time that no mother could feel closer to her children, could have a more solid, indestructible bond, than I did with each of them. But, I was deceived. Each one grew, each one took a different direction, and needed me less and less, until now, viewing those toddler times does not bring joy in the past experience, but sadness in the loss of it.
I still take photos. I can't help it, because I still want to capture my life, to keep it from moving on. But more and more, I find myself an observer, capturing my surroundings for others. I take photos at a friend's wedding, documenting her moments of happiness. I take photos of visitors, delighting in viewing our city through fresh eyes. I take photos of trees and flowers and sunrises, because they are beautiful, and I want to remember their beauty, and yet, they mean little ultimately because, after all, I can always download beautiful trees, flowers and sunrises from the Internet. They may not be the flowers in my yard, or the azaleas at my park this springtime, but who can tell?
So far, I'm thrilled with my new camera. I'm in its learning curve, but eager to fill up another 2-gig photo card, download my pictures, and perfect each one with my software. Still, I see that at this late time of life, I can't take photos of my babies; there won't be more snuggles with my children eager to cuddle Mommy, and while I'm proud of what each of my children has become and hopeful about what each will accomplish, it's just not the same.
Still, my life is much more vivid because of my photos. With digital, I relive happy moments each time my screen saver slide-show kicks in. Sometimes I delay going out just to see a few more images on my screen, just to enjoy the colors, the composition, the recollections even of the last three years since I got a digital camera. Because of these innovations, I get far more pleasure out of my photography than I ever have. And that is something that makes me happy--admiring the world a second time; being brought to places and people and joy in a way unlike any other, because when triggered by a photo, I am there again. The people at my son's bar mitzvah. A day at the beach with a city backdrop. An array of hydrangeas excited to bring summer
There's a downside and an upside to photos, but on balance, it's better to savor and capture life than to let it fade. Now, if I can just get my children to be less weary of posing....