Something to Hold

Earlier this week, I had the surreal experience of going through boxes of my grandma’s old photos as our family prepared for her funeral. And while there was, of course, a distinct sadness in the task, it was also overwhelmingly nostalgic and sweet.

My grandmother, born in 1930 and married by 1948, lived a well-documented life. What a treat it was to thumb through black-and-white Polaroids of toboggining trips to Tawas, weddings, birthdays, and accordion-playing card parties, spanning the course of her 95 years of life.

When she moved out of her perfectly curated home and into a small, bare room at an assisted living facility a few years ago, I realized how important it is to surround ourselves with physical mementos of what matters most. At a time when our digital footprints are robust and expansive, our photo albums and our walls are not. Over time, I came to see that the most meaningful gifts I could give her were printed photos- small windows into a world that, in many ways, was moving on without her.

In my view, the value of having something tangible to hold does not end with photos. Ongoing debates in the world of education suggest that students learn better with printed textbooks than with tablets or Chromebooks. Previously digital magazines (such as Nylon) have returned to print, film cameras are back, and artists are releasing their albums on vinyl and CDs, as Gen-Z drives the ever-growing “digital detox” phenomenon.

The human experience is tactile, shaped by thank-you notes, love letters, well-worn books, and fading Polaroid photos. I see it on my bookshelves: my special-edition Anne of Green Gables by

L.M. Montgomery with pages yellowed over time, and Julia Child’s paperback My Life in France with a spine that’s nearly broken. Proof that some of life’s most important things are meant to be held in our hands.